Medicine

Did Mooresville police warn about zip ties laced with fentanyl being placed on tire rims by sex or drug traffickers as claimed in several viral Facebook posts? No, that's not true: The Mooresville Police Department denied the rumor in a Facebook post of their own. Despite what urban legends say, fentanyl is not easily absorbed through skin contact so even…

Did Donald Trump post a tweet on November 6, 2012, that read, "If the Dow drops 1,000 points in two days the President should be impeached immediately!"? No, that's not true: This is a fake tweet that was manufactured in 2018, years after it was purportedly first posted. There is no record of the original tweet on Donald Trump's Twitter…

Did a study published in January 2025 definitively establish a link between Ozempic and blindness, as was implied in a post on X? No, that's not true: The study was a small observational analysis of just nine patients that did not establish that the weight-loss drug caused blindness but instead found an association between the two. In other words, it…

Is a study that claims vaccinated children have a 170 percent higher risk of autism reliable? No, that's not true: An infectious disease expert told Lead Stories the study is "just junk," saying the journal it was published in and the study design both lack credibility. Numerous large studies have found no proven link between vaccines and autism. The claim…

Did Denmark announce a "500% tariff on exports of Ozempic to the USA" in January 2025? No, that's not true: The claim derived from a parody post on LinkedIn that was not labeled as such. There was no such announcement on Danish government websites and no media outlets indexed by Google News reported on any such story. The claim originated…

Did two people who participated in the January 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol die within 24 hours of one another in early 2025, after being pardoned for their actions by President Donald Trump? No, that's not true: Although police killed one pardoned participant in January 2025, the other person in question died three months earlier. There is no evidence…

Does an article prove that the World Economic Forum "demanded" that the general public be "mass-vaccinated" twice a year with "long-acting mRNA injections"? No, that's not true: The organization told Lead Stories this was "entirely false." The article failed to offer any sources proving any such "demand" was made by the organization. It cited recordings of a conference panel in…

Is it true that there was no Alzheimer's disease until 1979 -- after the vegetable oils used in margarine were incorporated widely in modern diets? No, that's not true: In 1906 the "unusual disease of the cerebral cortex" was discovered by pathologist Alois Alzheimer. The abnormal brain atrophy he had identified was named after him four years later. An expert…

Did China declare a state of emergency over a spike in multiple respiratory infections as of January 3, 2025? No, that's not true: As of January 3, 2025, China's official sources made no such announcement. A spokesperson for the World Health Organization told Lead Stories that China's Center for Disease Control & Prevention reported an increase in respiratory illnesses but…

Is CoQ10 a proven treatment for preventing Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease? No, that's not true: A neurologist told Lead Stories that it is "false" to say that CoQ10 can prevent either disease. While some studies have explored the antioxidant's potential benefits, experts that Lead Stories spoke with said that results are not clear enough to prove that CoQ10 prevents either…