Yes, COVID-19 vaccines will help us safely resume normal activities like going to restaurants and meeting people, once enough people are vaccinated for herd immunity

CLAIM
The COVID-19 vaccines won’t let us stop mask-wearing, physical distancing and restaurants, pubs, and cinemas still remain closed, so why vaccinate?

SOURCE: Facebook users, Telegram, Facebook

Published: 04 Mar 2021

VERDICT

The CDC licences vaccine technology, but isn’t a vaccine company; the CDC doesn’t sell vaccines, it buys and distributes vaccines free of charge

CLAIM
“The CDC is not an independent agency. It is a vaccine company […] The CDC owns over 20 vaccine patents. It sells about $4.6 billion of vaccines every year”.

SOURCE: Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Children's Health Defense

Published: 04 Mar 2021

VERDICT

Scientific evidence demonstrates that wearing face masks and implementing lockdowns reduce the spread of COVID-19

CLAIM
“It’s been a year & there is still no evidence masks or lockdowns slow the spread of #COVID19”

SOURCE: Kimberly Klacik, Facebook

Published: 03 Mar 2021

VERDICT

Bananas may be healthy, but consuming them won’t treat gastrointestinal diseases nor limit the replication of HIV

CLAIM
“Bananas are a powerful antiviral food—so powerful that they have the capacity to repel growth of the retrovirus HIV“

SOURCE: Anthony William, Medical Medium

Published: 02 Mar 2021

VERDICT

Pregnant women can decide whether to receive the COVID-19 vaccine; safety monitoring suggests that COVID-19 vaccines don’t pose any specific risk for pregnant women

CLAIM
“Health officials push pregnant women to get covid shots, despite known risks”

SOURCE: Anonymous, Children’s Health Defense

Published: 01 Mar 2021

VERDICT

More evidence needed for the claim that vitamin D supplements reduce risk of COVID-19 infection

CLAIM
“Habitual use of vitamin D supplements was associated with a 34% lower risk of COVID-19 infection”; “This is an observational study so causation cannot be established”

SOURCE: Rhonda Patrick, Instagram

Published: 22 Feb 2021

VERDICT

The number of new COVID-19 cases fell and daily vaccination increased in early 2021, but no indication that it was due to U.S. president Biden taking office

CLAIM
COVID-19 cases are “down by 50%” and “daily vaccinations have increased by 85%” since “Biden took office”

SOURCE: Anonymous, Occupy Democrats

Published: 22 Feb 2021

VERDICT

COVID-19 vaccines don’t increase the incidence of poor outcomes during pregnancy, according to current safety data on COVID-19 vaccines

CLAIM
COVID-19 vaccines caused miscarriages

SOURCE: Facebook users, Twitter, Facebook

Published: 19 Feb 2021

VERDICT

Misleading to compare the safety of COVID-19 and flu vaccines based solely on VAERS reports; VAERS reports alone cannot demonstrate that a vaccine caused an adverse event

CLAIM
One person is 300 to 900 times “more likely to die” after getting the COVID-19 vaccine than the flu vaccine; “Adverse events are widely underreported”

SOURCE: Alex Berenson, Twitter, Facebook

Published: 17 Feb 2021

VERDICT

The CDC didn’t introduce a “major rule change” to inflate COVID-19 deaths; there have been more than 490,000 excess deaths in the U.S. to date

CLAIM
“CDC illegally inflated the COVID fatality number by at least 1,600 percent”; “the NVSS COVID-19 Alert No. 2 [deemphasized] underlying causes of death [...] by recording them in Part II rather than Part I of death certificates [...] This was a major rule change [...] from the 2003 guidance on certification of death

SOURCE: Patty McMurray, Gateway Pundit

Published: 14 Feb 2021

VERDICT