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SciCheck Digest Expanded reporting requirements and intense scrutiny of the hundreds of millions administered COVID-19 vaccine doses have driven record reporting of potential side effects to one of the government’s vaccine safety monitoring systems. Social media posts, however, have misleadingly insinuated that the increase in reports means the vaccines are […]

SciCheck Digest COVID-19 has killed more than 805,000 people in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Yet a viral video on social media suggests the disease is the same as a “common cold.” COVID-19 is in the same family of some cold viruses, but its […]

Quick Take  An increase in pandemic restrictions in Germany sparked a protest at a market, where a man dressed as Santa Claus was briefly detained. Online posts falsely claimed he was arrested for not wearing a mask. But police said he was detained for participating in an unregistered protest. What […]

Quick Take Climate change and other human-caused factors continue to put many species at risk, according to conservation groups. But a social media post misleadingly claims polar bears, whales and koala populations are “recovered” or increasing. All three species remain “critically endangered” or “vulnerable,” the International Union for Conservation of […]

SciCheck Digest The COVID-19 vaccines available in the U.S. were found to be safe and effective in clinical trials and real-world conditions. Dr. Anthony Fauci did not admit that “Covid Vaccines May Actually Make People ‘Worse,’” as a viral headline misleadingly claims. Fauci’s March 2020 remarks about testing future vaccines […]

SciCheck Digest Many U.S. athletes have been vaccinated against COVID-19 without any adverse effects. But a conservative outlet has cited a list of supposedly vaccine-injured athletes to claim “there may be something wrong with the vaccine.” There’s no proof that the listed athletes — most of them are actually retired […]

Summary Mass rollout of the COVID-19 vaccines has been the defining story of 2021, yet for all its success, vaccination rates remain stubbornly low in some populations. As with all things in American life these days, partisanship has played an outsized roll: an estimated four in 10 Republicans, for example, […]

SciCheck Digest The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends COVID-19 vaccines for pregnant people, and the World Health Organization says the vaccines are safe for them. Yet online articles cite a Canadian doctor who falsely claims that the vaccines have caused an unusually high number of stillbirths in Canadian […]

SciCheck Digest The COVID-19 vaccines administered in the U.S. are not known to increase the risk of heart attack. But social media posts are misinterpreting an abstract in an American Heart Association journal as proof that the vaccine kills. The publisher later issued an “expression of concern” about the abstract […]

Q: Is Pope Francis dying? A: There is no credible evidence that he is terminally ill. The viral claim is based on a single news story published Dec. 6 by Newsmax, a conservative news outlet, which attributed the information to an unidentified Vatican source. No other publication has reported it.   […]