If one person in your family tests positive for coronavirus, everyone in the household is listed as positive even if theyve never been tested. Everyone who dies during the coronavirus pandemic is counted as a COVID death. Wearing a mask is bad for you.

Chances are, youve seen or heard one of those statements since the coronavirus pandemic began in March. But just because they are circulating doesnt mean they should be accepted at face value.

The Alabama Department of Public Health and the Jefferson County Department of Health are addressing some of these rumors in a series of social media posts.

Rumors and misinformation can easily circulate within communities during a crisis. Do your part to the stop the spread of rumors by doing three easy things: Find trusted sources of information; share information from trusted sources; discourage others from sharing information from unverified sources, ADPH said in a recent post.

ADPH cited to examples of recent rumors or misinformation that have been circulated. From ADPH:

Pictured are two examples of rumors or misinformation we have seen recently. The screenshot containing a rumor about tainted kits in Tuscaloosa is FALSE. We believe people are using recent quality control issues with out of state laboratories not used by Alabama and an incident where the CDC distributed tests that did not meet early quality control measures at the beginning of the pandemic in February to create rumors of tainted tests.

With regard to the misinformation provided in the screenshot reading "So if your Corona test is positive it could also be the common cold," if you visit the link provided: cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/testing/serology-overview.html, you will see the excerpt that was screen captured is discussing the antibody test for SAR-CoV-2, not the viral test used to test current infection. This post is misrepresenting information which may lead you to believe that if you get a positive COVID-19 test result it means you could have a cold.

The PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 is very specific, meaning a positive test is highly reliable. On a side note, the Alabama Department of Public Health does not recommend antibody testing for diagnosis of COVID-19 because of accuracy and interpretation of such tests. Antibody tests are not authorized by the FDA for diagnostic purposes in COVID-19 and some antibody tests have been removed from the market due to inaccuracy.

Jefferson County

The Jefferson County Department of Health has also provided answers to some of the most common coronavirus myths. Top of the list is one that just wont seem to go away:

Question Ive heard in Jefferson County that if one family member tests positive, the entire family is counted as positive and that is what is inflating our numbers.

Not true: Jefferson Countys care numbers are not based on the number of positive test results person. Only the first positive counts towards the case numbers. Example: If a person tests positive, has the virus and requires multiple tests to see if they are negative, those positive tests are not counted as additional positive tests.

You can see more questions and answers below.

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Coronavirus rumors and hoaxes: Alabama health officials address misinformation on testing, cases - AL.com