Are COVID-19 vaccines "weapons of mass destruction"? No, that's not true: There's no public evidence the vaccines put the future of mankind at risk. To the contrary, medical authorities widely agree the vaccines represent one of our best hopes of quashing the pandemic. The claim is one of several made during a video that recycles debunked conspiracy theories about COVID-19…

Is Donald Trump the "real" president, does Joe Biden not fly on Air Force One, does hydroxychloroquine "fix" COVID-19 and do masks not stop the spread of coronavirus? No, that's not true: Biden won the election and became President of the United States at 12:01 on January 20, 2021, per the U.S. Constitution. Trump is no longer the president and…

Did the COVID-19 stimulus bill give members of the U.S. House of Representatives a $25 million bonus? No, that's not true: The $1.9 trillion bill, known as the American Rescue Plan, does not give bonuses or raises to House members. The claim states that "Line 17" awards the bonus. The 628-page bill has a line 17 on almost every page,…

Did Anthony Hopkins fake receiving a COVID-19 shot from a staffer at a California hospital in the video the actor posted on Instagram? No, that's not true: In a March 10, 2021, email to Lead Stories, a spokeswoman for CHA Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center said that "the video does indeed show our staff administering the full dose of vaccine to…

Does the video "The One About Vackseenz," correctly describe the genetic impacts of COVID-19 vaccines? No, that's not true. The video peddles multiple COVID-19 conspiracy theories, including that messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines "alter the function of your genetic code," which government and private experts have told Lead Stories is not how mRNA works. The post uses the misspelling of "vaccine"…

Did a laboratory analysis commissioned by a German children's charity find bacteria and mold on a mask? Yes, that is true, but it does not mean these microorganisms are harmful or abnormal. According to experts, it is likely that the bacteria found on the mask are just the regular bacteria found on the skin and in the mouth. Without further…

Is it true that the SARS-CoV-2 virus has not been positively identified, that the PCR test is not accurate after a certain point and that there are major ways to become ill other than through airborne transmission of the virus, such as by acute electromagnetic radiation poisoning? No, none of that is true: Virologists and other scientists have used genetic…

Did Klaus Schwab tweet that there are coming food shortages and that his World Economic Forum is working with the Biden administration to ensure that most people survive? No, that's not true: This is a tweet from a fake Twitter account that is not Klaus Schwab's. The parody Twitter account has been suspended. A screenshot of this fake tweet from…

Is there "still no evidence masks or lockdowns slow the spread of COVID-19"? No, that's not true: The claim was posted with no citation of studies disproving the effectiveness of masks and lockdowns. On the other hand, there are now dozens of scientific studies published showing that wearing masks and instituting lockdowns or stay-at-home orders have been effective in slowing…

Did the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention withhold data that showed a federal vaccine reaction-reporting database -- VAERS -- was under-reporting the number of people who have died after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine? Does the CDC not even collect data on vaccine-related deaths? Is it "not credible" that vaccines have caused none of the 1,100 reported deaths of Americans…

Did President Biden say the US didn't have a COVID-19 vaccine before he took office? No, that's not true: he said there was no supply of the vaccine in storage awaiting distribution, not that the vaccine didn't exist. The words in quotation marks in the meme are not an accurate verbatim quote and also leave out the rest of what…

Does a video by an anti-vaccine physician show conclusive scientific evidence that the antibodies produced by the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines will cause severe harm and even death if a vaccinated person is exposed to the COVID virus after inoculation? No, it does not: The claims by Dr. Sherri Tenpenny and other vaccine opponents lack rigorous scientific testing to…

Did Facebook and the American Journal of Medicine "admit" they were wrong about a malaria drug's effectiveness against COVID-19? No, that's not true: The claim refers to a Facebook Oversight Board ruling that contains no endorsement of the medical effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine. The editor and managing editor of the American Journal of Medicine say their scholarly publication has taken no…

Does this list of reports from the federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) prove COVID-19 vaccines are causing sudden deaths in a surprising number of young and middle-aged people? No, that's not true: The individual cases in the VAERS system - as the VAERS builders clearly state, have not been verified. Anyone can file a report to the VAERS…

Are the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines gene therapy that alters recipients' immune systems, a potential Nuremberg Code violation for doctors and nurses to administer them without telling patients they are part of a drug trial, and are they killing or seriously injuring thousands of vaccine recipients? No, These claims are either untrue, made without evidence or leave out context:…

Did the CDC inflate COVID-19 death numbers by 1,600% and did it violate federal law by enacting new data collecting rules for cause-of-death reports? No, that's not true: The nation's mortality data expert told Lead Stories The Centers for Disease Control did not change its reporting rules when the COVID-19 virus outbreak began in the United States in 2020. Further,…

Do mRNA vaccines increase the risk of death for COVID-19 patients, provoke immune system over-reactions and turn patients into genetically modified organisms whose own immune systems attack them? No, that's not true: mRNA vaccines do not alter human genes. Cytokine storms, an immune system overreaction, are an occasional symptom of COVID-19, treated with the same steroids as those administered to…

Were Super Bowl LV attendees "packed like sardines" at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida, on February 7, 2021, creating the potential of a superspreader COVID-19 event? No, that's not true: Those weren't all people at the championship game. An NFL spokesman tweeted the day of the Super Bowl that there were 30,000 fan cutouts throughout the stadium in addition…

Did students in a school in Nigeria jump from a balcony to get away from a mandatory vaccine? No, that's not true: This is video of a May 2019 incident at the Community Secondary School in Oroworukwo, in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. The stampede was caused by the detonation of a canister of tear-gas that had been brought to school by…

Is the Canadian government putting passengers arriving on international flights into 'forced detention' in a 'COVID camp'? No, that's not true: Canada has recently required passengers arriving on international flights, who had traveled for non-essential reasons, to "reserve a room in a hotel for three nights at their own cost," while they await their COVID-19 test results. This quarantine measure…