LEADING horse trainer Fergal O’Brien copped a Twitter ban after a joke about coronavirus backfired spectacularly.
The Grade One-winning trainer based in Cheltenham was locked out of his account after a jibe was deemed to have ‘violated the policy on spreading misleading and potentially harmful information’.
A tweet sent from O’Brien’s official account took aim at professor Karol Sikora, who has nearly 350,000 followers.
It read: “Prof Sikora has had his Covid vaccine. He plumped for the one laced with mindless optimism rather than the one with 5G in it.”
The offending tweet was deleted but posted on O’Brien’s Instagram page – along with Twitter’s reasoning for his ban.
The message from Twitter read: “We understand that during times of crisis and instability, it is difficult to know what to do to keep yourself and your loved ones safe.
“Under this policy, we require the removal of content that may pose a risk to people’s health, including content that goes directly against guidance from authoritative sources of global and local public health information.”
Discredited conspiracy theories about a link between 5G and coronavirus have surged in popularity.
But experts have rubbished the theories that have no basis in fact.
A number of tweets from O’Brien’s account were sent out once the 12-hour ban was lifted.
One read: “Oh the irony of our Prof Sikora joke being classed as Covid misinformation whilst he was allowed to tweet absolute s***e throughout the spring and summer of 2020. FML.”
Another said: “We were asked to remove the offending tweet (and did so) but still got a 12hr ban.
“That’s like opting for three points on your licence and still having to do the feckin’ speed awareness course.”
Another post read: “So in Twitter jail you can see people posting stuff and having fun, you just can’t interact at all.
“It’s like watching your mates eat a Victoria sponge from behind a Perspex screen.”
O’Brien, who has won more than £500,000 in prize money this season with 74 winners, is hugely popular with punters on social media.
He has amassed more than 36,000 followers and regularly engages with fans.
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