Behavioural science has been used inappropriately during the CCP virus pandemic to scare the public into complying with the rules, a former leading member of the government’s controversial “Nudge Unit” said. Simon Ruda, a co-founder of the Behavioural Insights Team (BI)—the UK government’s original nudge unit before its privatisation and global expansion—questioned if behaviour science has inadvertently been used to sanction “state propaganda” during the crisis. Two BI executives currently sit on the government’s 48-member Scientific Pandemic Insights Group on Behaviours (SPI-B), a sub-group under the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE). Other SPI-B members are mostly university professors and scientists from a number of government departments. According to the government’s estimate, the information campaign on CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic—using every means possible including social media, influencers, radio, TV, and widespread digital marketing—has reached 95 percent of adults on average 17 times per week at the peak—the biggest since World War II. A SAGE document published …