[throwawayfrauds]

I think they realized that deleting tweets really helps shut down conspiracy theories. The main Twitter account I followed for videos of the pandemic situation in China at the beginning of 2020 was banned just before covid really hit the US. Numerous blue-check accounts (including some fringe “journalists”) had reported it for misinformation and several claimed the situation was not that bad in China and that the videos were somehow doctored. He stopped posting anything about the pandemic on his Facebook and Instagram accounts out of fear of having those permanently banned as well. So censorship can work. The saddest thing is that Twitter banned his account without any government intervention.

EDIT: Not all of reporters I mentioned were fringe. Two were from the Atlantic and Buzzfeed, and both claimed that the Coronavirus situation was overblown and that people saying otherwise were fear-mongering. Helping them out were a couple of epidemiologists who were also claiming that the coronavirus danger was overhyped. This was late January 2020.