When a novel coronavirus emerged late in 2019, people tended to read past the “novel” part of the term. But the fact that it was a novelty to scientists meant that little was really known about it then.

Early ideas about its transmission led to some changing advice — mask or not, scrub down surfaces or not — as well as stories made out of whole cloth that experts soon dismissed as falsehoods.

The sad trouble was that on this landscape littered with conspiracy theories, the power of experts to redirect the public as they learned more has been limited. Social media, with a business model built on clicks, note what stories people read and then feed them more of the same.

What seems missing is the capability to sort through the information and assess which sources deliver trustworthy information. And that’s led to misinformation circulating, with a pandemic-level contagion of its own.

In January, as vaccine distribution was just beginning, a University of Hawaii webinar on vaccines tapped the topic of misinformation. Soo Yun Shin, an assistant professor specializing in online communication, said the best strategy is immediate and repeated assertion of facts. And, Shin said, it should be done without personal attacks.

Unfortunately, in the ensuing months, a lot of the conversation quickly became as polarized as the rest of political discourse.

The backdrop to all this is a society in which trust of institutions — medicine, media, government — has weakened. Over the long term, what could help is better understanding of facts and how to gauge the credibility of a source.

In July, the state of Illinois enacted a new requirement that every public high school include a course on media literacy, so that youth would have the tools to navigate the information minefield of the internet. Something similar for Hawaii should be considered by the state Department of Education.

But in the near term, this state like all others is confronting a real impediment to extinguishing the virus.

It’s good that community leaders are stepping up to counter it. The vaccine-hesitant need to get their advice from medical experts who take responsibility for their care, not the online rumor mill. It’s a gradual, continuous process.

”Persuasion takes time,” Shin said.

Undoubtedly. But the time to turn the tide is running out, as the coronavirus’ delta variant spreads.