This article is more than 6 months old

This article is more than 6 months old

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has banned a series of “alarmist” and “scaremongering” ads for face masks that it said played on people’s fears over the coronavirus outbreak.

In rulings published on Wednesday, the regulator found that online ads from two companies breached its code and were misleading, irresponsible and “likely to cause fear without reasonable justification”.

Quick guide What are coronavirus symptoms and should I go to a doctor? Show Hide What is Covid-19? Covid-19 is caused by a member of the coronavirus family that has never been encountered before. Like other coronaviruses, it has come from animals. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared it a pandemic. What are the symptoms this coronavirus causes? According to the WHO, the most common symptoms of Covid-19 are fever, tiredness and a dry cough. Some patients may also have a runny nose, sore throat, nasal congestion and aches and pains or diarrhoea. Some people report losing their sense of taste and/or smell. About 80% of people who get Covid-19 experience a mild case – about as serious as a regular cold – and recover without needing any special treatment. About one in six people, the WHO says, become seriously ill. The elderly and people with underlying medical problems like high blood pressure, heart problems or diabetes, or chronic respiratory conditions, are at a greater risk of serious illness from Covid-19. In the UK, the National health Service (NHS) has identified the specific symptoms to look for as experiencing either: a high temperature - you feel hot to touch on your chest or back

a new continuous cough - this means you’ve started coughing repeatedly As this is viral pneumonia, antibiotics are of no use. The antiviral drugs we have against flu will not work, and there is currently no vaccine. Recovery depends on the strength of the immune system. Should I go to the doctor if I have a cough? Medical advice varies around the world - with many countries imposing travel bans and lockdowns to try and prevent the spread of the virus. In many place people are being told to stay at home rather than visit a doctor of hospital in person. Check with your local authorities. In the UK, NHS advice is that anyone with symptoms should stay at home for at least 7 days. If you live with other people, they should stay at home for at least 14 days, to avoid spreading the infection outside the home.

One advertiser, Novads OU, based in Tallinn, Estonia, ran display ads and webpages for an Oxybreath Pro face mask, which highlighted the death toll from the coronavirus outbreak and referred to a “growing sense of panic” before touting the mask’s “unparallelled [sic] protection.”

Another ad for the face mask, which appeared on the CNN website through the Outbrain network, linked to a webpage that claimed the virus was spreading at “the speed of light” and declared “peace of mind is priceless during this terrifying time” and urged people to buy the mask while it was still available.

Yet another ad appeared on the Scottish Sun website and linked to a webpage that resembled a news story. It warned that the “nano-tech” face mask was “selling out fast”.

Novads OU did not respond to the ASA’s inquiries about the adverts or its ruling that the ads should not appear again. The company’s UK telephone number was answered by a woman who identified as Sheila in Hong Kong, who said a representative from the firm would respond to the Guardian.

She said queries should also be made to an email address for a firm called Hyperstech.com. Neither provided a response.

The ASA also ruled against Easy Shopping 4 Home, a UK-based trader on Amazon marketplace, for promoting an “anti-coronavirus” respirator, a phrasing the regulator believed would exploit concerns about the virus.

The firm also failed to respond to the ASA’s inquiries. The Guardian did not receive a response from the company.

In both cases, the watchdog upheld the challenge that the companies’ adverts were “misleading, irresponsible and scaremongering”.

“We’ve banned these ads for face masks because the claims they made went against advice offered by the public health authority, Public Health England, and were therefore misleading,” said Matt Wilson at the ASA.

“They were also irresponsible because they were alarmist and played on people’s fears. PHE do not recommend the use of face masks as a means of protection from coronavirus.

“Our rulings don’t, and we’re not seeking to, comment more generally on the efficacy of face masks or the legitimate right for companies to sell them or people to wear them.”

The intervention came a week after Facebook banned ads for products that claimed to cure or prevent Covid-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, or which created a “sense of urgency” about the outbreak.

Face masks may offer some protection against the virus by forming a barrier against the larger droplets that infected people cough into the air. But exhaled droplets quickly shrink and virus particles are small enough to penetrate masks without high-specification filters.

One concern is that masks can give people a false sense of reassurance that leads them to be less vigilant on other hygiene measures, such as regular hand washing and not touching the eyes, nose or mouth.

The ASA has worked with Amazon and other platforms that carried the face mask ads to remove the pages and adverts from their networks.

The platforms were monitoring for similar adverts and taking action against them as necessary, Wilson said. They have also updated their policies in response to the latest advice from health authorities and off the back of the ASA rulings, he added.