Tag: Fact-checking

CLAIM: Video shows Ukrainians burning down an Orthodox church in
the village of Novopoltavka in Ukraine.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The video is from 2013 and shows a Russian Orthodox church on fire in
Ilyinka village in southern Russia.

THE FACTS: The video circulated widely on social media in recent
days, with false claims that it shows Ukrainians setting fire to an Orthodox
church in Novopoltavka, part of the country’s Mykolaiv
region.

Social media accounts affiliated with the Russian government also
fueled the false narrative.

“Another Orthodox church burned down in Ukraine,” stated a
Facebook post from the Russian Embassy in London published on Friday, which was later deleted. “This
time a cruel fate befell a church of the canonical UOC in the village of
Novopoltavka. The footage shows people watching in horror at the burning
church, which was set on fire by either security forces or dissenters,” the
false post read.

The false claims also spread on Twitter and Telegram.

However, the video is a decade old and shows a church ablaze in
Russia, not Ukraine.

A YouTube account posted the same video of the fire with a Russian caption that stated “burning church in Ilyinka” on
Jan. 22, 2013, along with several other videos capturing alternate angles of the fire. A website belonging to the Volodarsky district, in Russia’s Astrakhan
region, describes a blaze at the Church of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God in Ilyinka that same day.

The church was rebuilt a few years later, as seen in a YouTube
video posted on Jan. 28, 2016 by a local news outlet in the Astrakhan
region.

After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) declared
independence from Moscow’s Patriarchate, who it was loyal to since the 17th
century, the AP reported. But Ukrainian
security agencies claim that the UOC keeps close ties with Russia and they have
carried out raids of the church’s holy sites, sharing photos of rubles and
Russian passports, along with leaflets with messages from the Moscow
patriarch. Prominent Ukrainian Orthodox Church leaders have rejected the allegations of ties with Moscow, insisting they have supported Ukraine from the start of the war and that a government crackdown will only hand a propaganda coup to Russia.

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This is part of AP’s effort to
address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and
organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating
online. Learn more about
fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: There are no longer new variants of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Public health officials continue to track and monitor emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants. They can be seen on the World Health Organization website.

THE FACTS: The falsehood circulated across social media in recent days, with some suggesting variants are only used to distract from other issues.

“Anyone else find it odd we just stopped having new variants all the sudden?” reads one tweet migrated across platforms.

A video on Instagram, meanwhile, asks whether it was strange that “we went from variant to variant to variant to no more variants,” suggesting they had instead been replaced by a supposed “trans agenda.” The caption similarly suggests variants have “disappeared.”

But it’s simply not true that variants of SARS-CoV-2 have “stopped” or “disappeared.”

The WHO continues to monitor and designate variants as they emerge. The agency has in the initial months of 2023 designated several as “variants of interest” or “variants under monitoring.” One variant, XBB.1.16, was first documented in a sample in January 2023.

The WHO updated its tracking system in March to provide more granularity in monitoring sublineages of the dominant omicron variant and also said it would only use Greek letters for new “variants of concern” moving forward. It previously used them for variants of interest as well.

“SARS-CoV-2 variants do continue to appear,” John Lednicky, a virologist and research professor at the University of Florida’s Department of Environmental and Global Health, told The Associated Press in an email.

“The current variants of SARS-CoV-2 appear to be less virulent, as expected for a virus that is ‘adapting to its host,’” Lednicky said. But, he emphasized, it’s possible that more severe strains could emerge.

It is true that new variants have not commanded the same level of public concern as some earlier variants.

Andy Pekosz, a virologist and professor of molecular microbiology and immunology at Johns Hopkins University, said in addition to changes in how variants are classified, “there is much less sequencing of viruses going on now, so we aren’t able to report on new variants as quickly as we used to.”

Emerging variants have also shown a “gradual accumulation of one or two mutations at a time” as opposed to variants with lots of new mutations, Pekosz said. He added that future COVID-19 booster shots may be updated to provide better protection from the changing virus.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: The CEO of Anheuser-Busch resigned after the brewing company’s Bud Light beer brand partnered with Dylan Mulvaney, a transgender social media influencer, for a sponsored video.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The claim started as a satirical article and used the wrong name in references to the CEO. Anheuser-Busch confirmed that the company’s CEO didn’t resign.

THE FACTS: After Mulvaney released a video with Bud Light, coinciding with the final days of the NCAA’s March Madness tournament, some conservative social media personalities and celebrities responded with transphobic rhetoric and calls to boycott the brand.

However, these attacks haven’t resulted in the resignation of the CEO of Bud Light’s parent company, as many social media users have claimed.

The claims spread across the internet in an article with the headline, “Anheuser Busch CEO Resigns As Bud Light Sales Plummet To Record Low.”

The story referred to a “CEO Augustus Anheuser III” and claims he “left the corporate headquarters in shame after tendering his resignation.”

But a search for the text of the article shows it originated as satire. It appeared on a satirical website that discloses it publishes “parody, satire, and tomfoolery.” Some other blogs reposted the same text without the disclaimer, and social media users spread the claim as real news.

The story also has errors that make it clear it was fabricated.

For example, Anheuser-Busch’s CEO is named Brendan Whitworth, not Augustus Anheuser III, who isn’t a real person. A former executive of the company is named August Anheuser Busch III.

The claim that the Anheuser-Busch CEO resigned “is inaccurate and there is no truth to it,” the company confirmed in an emailed statement.

The Associated Press last week debunked a false claim that Anheuser-Busch fired its marketing department in response to Bud Light’s advertising. This claim also started as satire.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: Fox News covered a new chicken sandwich from Popeyes on Monday morning instead of a deadly mass shooting in Louisville, Kentucky.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. An image claiming to show the broadcast was fabricated. Online archives show Fox News had extensive coverage throughout the morning of the Louisville shooting, in which five people were killed. Regardless, Popeyes did not announce a new chicken sandwich on Monday.

THE FACTS: In the hours after the shooting at Louisville’s Old National Bank, social media users began sharing the falsified image as proof that Fox News covered a story about the fried chicken chain instead of the tragedy.

The image shows what appears to be a Fox News broadcast, including a photo of a Popeyes fried chicken sandwich and captions stating, “Chicken Sandwich Wars” and “Popeyes Announces New Sandwich.” One tweet in which it was featured had received more than 6,000 likes and more than 2,000 shares as of Monday.

But the image does not show an actual Fox News broadcast. It uses an old photo of a Popeyes chicken sandwich, along with text along the bottom of the screen that appears to be referring to a 2019 story on canceled trade and climate summits in Chile.

Fox News reporting from Monday morning on the Louisville shooting appears in online archives. Louisville police said on Twitter that officers were on the scene of the shooting within minutes and that calls first came in for the shooting at about 8:30 a.m. The story was covered by Fox News starting midmorning on the East Coast.

Sofie Watson, a spokesperson for Fox News, confirmed to The Associated Press that these claims about the network’s coverage are not true.

Additionally, Popeyes has not recently announced a new chicken sandwich on any of its social media platforms. The chain released its crispy chicken sandwich, which is pictured in the fabricated image, in 2019.

Louisville Metro Police Department Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel identified the shooter as Connor Sturgeon, a 25-year-old employee of Old National Bank who livestreamed the attack on Instagram, and said that he was killed by police in an exchange of gunfire. Sturgeon’s victims included a close friend of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear. Nine people were injured, one of whom later died. Two police officers were among those injured, including one in critical condition.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A disheveled room with transgender and NATO flags seen in a widespread photo belonged to the shooter who killed six people at a private Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee, this week.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. That image was posted online as far back as 2021 by a Twitter user who shared the image — along with another picture of the room after it had been tidied. That account indicated in tweets this week that the image was being misrepresented.

THE FACTS: Social media users are spreading the image to suggest it shows the bedroom of Audrey Hale, the 28-year-old who killed three adults and three young students at the The Covenant School on Monday.

“>Shooter had NAFO, trans, and socialist flags,” reads one tweet that was also shared on Instagram. “>Targeted Christian school Hmmmmm.”

The picture shows a messy room adorned with pride, transgender and NATO flags, among others. The floor is filled with plastic bags and other belongings and shelves near a window holds various figurines.

But the room did not belong to Hale, who police identified as transgender.

Reverse image searches show the photo has circulated online since at least late 2021.

A Twitter account from an individual who identifies as being in Michigan shared the image on Dec. 16, 2021, along with another photo that shows a tidier version of the same room.

“Before and after,” the user wrote. “I still need to clean out my closet so i can actually organize the mostly folded pile of clothes but I’m mostly done. I have to clean my desk next.”

The account tweeted this week about the claims misidentifying the room as belonging to Hale, saying, “IM GETTING SAM HYDED” — a reference to a long-running hoax in which comedian Sam Hyde is misidentified as the suspect in various shootings.

Police have said Hale was a former student of the school, The Associated Press has reported. No motive has been confirmed by police, but officials said Hale targeted the school, not any particular individual killed in the shooting. Hale was fatally shot by police.

The victims were identified as Cynthia Peak, 61; Katherine Koonce, 60; Mike Hill, 61; and Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney, all age 9.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: More than 90% of all mass shootings have happened in so-called “gun-free zones.”

AP’S ASSESSMENT: Missing context. The oft-cited figure comes from a study by a gun rights advocacy group that gun violence experts say is flawed. They say the study draws from federal data on “active shooter” incidents, which is not the same as a mass shooting. It also excludes gang-related incidents, yet includes military bases and other locations that aren’t arguably “gun free.” There is no definitive data on how many “mass shootings” occur in “gun-free” zones, because there is no consensus on how to define either term, experts said.

THE FACTS: In the wake of Monday’s shooting a Christian school in Nashville, social media users are sharing a post that claims nearly all mass shootings happen in designated “gun-free zones” where firearms are expressly prohibited, such as schools.

“The facts: 92-98% of mass shootings happen in gun-free zones. Today was yet another example of that,” reads the Instagram post. “Great job on the Gun Free School Zones Act, Clinton and Biden.”

The post refers to a 1990 law that made it illegal for anyone to possess a firearm in a school zone unless part of a school program or by a law enforcement officer. It was signed into law when former Democratic President Bill Clinton was in office and current President Joe Biden served as a Democratic U.S. senator from Delaware.

The figure comes from a study by gun rights advocacy group the Crime Prevention Research Center. The group in a 2018 report asserted that 94% of mass public shootings since 1950 happened in gun-free zones. The group’s president has pointed to the figures to argue that gun-free zones “invite” mass shootings.

But gun violence experts caution that the study and the conclusions drawn from it are flawed.

For one thing, looking at gun violence data from 1950 to 1990 is “irrelevant” because many states banned or heavily restricted concealed firearms during that period, according to Daniel Webster, a scholar at Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Gun Violence Solutions in Baltimore, Maryland.

That, he argued, would make almost any public mass shooting during those years as having taken place in a gun-free zone.

Webster and other experts also argued that the center’s study wrongly classifies places where armed officers are stationed — such as military bases — as gun-free zones. It also excluded gang-related shootings and other mass shootings related to other major crimes.

“That defies logic,” Webster wrote in an email, referring to military bases and other secure locations. “Not only are guns allowed in such places, often they are 100% certain to have someone armed, trained, paid, and under orders to protect against public mass shootings.”

What’s more, the center’s study relies on the FBI’s data on “active shooter” incidents, which isn’t the same as a mass shooting, said Jaclyn Schildkraut, executive director of the Rockefeller Institute of Government’s Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium in Albany, New York.

“You could have 0 fatalities and injuries and be included in that data,” she wrote in an email. “Not every active shooter event goes on to become a mass shooting either.”

In response, John Lott, president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, argued that the exclusion of shootings stemming from gang violence or other crimes is appropriate.

In an email Wednesday, he said the “causes and solutions” of those violent incidents are “dramatically different” from those of typical mass shootings, where the aim is generally to kill or injure as many people as possible.

Lott also argues that classifying military bases and other locations where armed officers or security are present is also appropriate.

“What you need to understand is that Fort Hood is no different than a city where only the military police are allowed to carry guns,” he wrote, referring to the Texas army base that has been the site of mass shootings in 2009 and 2014. “The attackers at Fort Hood knew that.”

And if the earliest decades of the center’s study are excluded, Lott said his research still shows that 87% of mass shootings occurred in gun-free zones from 1990 through this Monday.

Researchers say competing studies pushed by gun control advocacy groups also have their shortcomings.

A study by Everytown for Gun Safety, for example, found that between 2009 and 2016, just 10% of mass shootings took place in gun-free zones. Most mass shootings, the group found, occur in private residences that are not considered gun-free zones.

But Everytown defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more people, excluding the shooter, died. That likely underestimates the true number of mass shootings since it does not account for incidents in which many are badly injured but few died, according to experts

Part of the problem is there isn’t a generally accepted definition of what constitutes a “mass shooting,” Schildkraut and others say. There’s also no good way to verify whether every single location analyzed in a study is in fact “gun-free,” as the designation is only federally mandated on schools, she and others said.

For example, Lott’s report counts a 2015 shooting at Umpqua Community College in Oregon as happening at a gun-free zone, even though the college allowed people with a concealed carry permit to bring firearms on campus.

“In short, I would say that the 10% number is too low, but the 98% statistic is too high in terms of the percentage of mass shootings that occur in legally designated gun-free zones,” Schildkraut wrote in an email.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM:

A series of images shows a great white shark that washed up on an Outer Banks beach in North Carolina.

AP’S ASSESSMENT:

False. The images, which first appeared on a Facebook account which shares synthetic images of the Outer Banks barrier islands, are not authentic. A shark expert told The Associated Press there were several signs the images are not real. In addition, officials in the area said they weren’t aware of any recent reports of beached sharks.

THE FACTS:

Rumors of the beached shark surfaced on social media in recent days after a series of five images was shared beyond the account which originally posted it last week.

“A giant great white shark found washed out on the Outer Banks beach, North Carolina,” one Facebook post states. “A team of onlookers doing their best to push it back into the ocean.” It had received more than 9,700 shares and more than 3,800 likes as of Wednesday.

In some of the images the shark is lying in the sand, while in others people are helping to move it back to the ocean.

The Facebook account which first posted the images did not reply to an inquiry about how they were created. An Etsy shop associated with the account that sells prints of similar images suggests that they are created using digital tools.

“These are works of art that can be printed and hung on the walls,” it states in a description of each image. “I use several programs to achieve the desired results.”

While the origin of these images specifically is unclear, artificial intelligence tools that allow users to generate fabricated images that look like real photos are now widely available online, resulting in other examples of synthetic content being portrayed as authentic.

Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at the Florida Museum of Natural History, told the AP that there are also a number of biological and environmental reasons it is unlikely that the images show a real shark. A real shark of this size, for instance, would likely be much more banged up if it ended up on land.

“If this was a white shark it would be a very large one,” Naylor said. “A very, very large one. Probably 18 or 19 feet. And when they get that big and they get stranded, which they do once in a while, their weight is so big that they sort of flop around and they look pretty worse for wear.”

He noted that in one image the tide is out much farther than in the others, an indication it would have to have been taken at least half an hour after the others, giving the shark time to dry out. But the shark has a shiny sheen in every image, indicating that it is wet.

A great white shark named Breton broke the surface of the water near the Outer Banks on Tuesday, according to tracking data from OCEARCH, a nonprofit ocean research organization. However, OCEARCH spokesperson Paige Finney told the AP in an email that the nonprofit does not know of any sharks that washed ashore in the area.

“When an animal such as a white shark comes on the beach there are protocols in place,” she wrote. “As far as we know, no agency was ever contacted about a large white shark in the Outer Banks last week.”

The Facebook account which first shared the images did not specify when the alleged event occurred, but included the post’s date — March 25 — in a description of what it supposedly depicts.

Dorothy Hester, a spokesperson for Dare County, North Carolina, which covers part of the Outer Banks, also said that she was “not aware” of an incident involving a beached shark.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A transgender woman posted a photo of herself holding a gun and calling for violence against Christians, referencing a “Trans Day of Vengeance.”

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. A Twitter account posted a years-old photo of Alana McLaughlin, an MMA fighter and trans woman, holding a gun and falsely suggesting she used the threatening language. McLaughlin confirmed she didn’t author the post.

THE FACTS: A screenshot of the tweet amassed thousands of shares in the wake of Monday’s mass shooting at a private school in Nashville, where police have said the shooter was transgender.

The tweet shows McLaughlin with pink hair and a pink shirt, holding an AR-15 style gun and wearing a Glock-19 pistol with an expanded magazine on her waist, with a pink, blue and white transgender pride flag in the background.

The caption appears to advocate for violence against Christians, including the verbs “kill,” “behead,” “roundhouse,” “slam dunk,” “crucify,” “defecate in” and “launch.”

Some social media posts claimed the tweet was proof McLaughlin was organizing or planning to attend an April 1 protest event outside the U.S. Supreme Court called the “Trans Day of Vengeance.”

But McLaughlin, who lives in Oregon, confirmed she didn’t author the post and was not aware of where this event was taking place or planning to attend.

There is no evidence the Twitter account that originally posted the violent tweet, which was later suspended from the platform, has any ties to the planned event. The event website on Wednesday featured language clarifying that it was “about unity, not inciting violence.”

Noah Buchanan, co-founder of Trans Radical Activist Network, which is organizing the event, also confirmed to the AP in an email that McLaughlin is not affiliated with the protest, and reiterated that it was not intended to be a violent event.

The image of McLaughlin used in social media posts dates to 2020, when it was featured in a Huck Magazine profile about her and other LGBTQ people who said they had decided to arm themselves to stay safe amid violence directed toward their community.

“It is entirely defensive,” said McLaughlin, who added that she arms herself to protect against “escalating right-wing threats.”

McLaughlin said the photo had been misrepresented in other ways in the past, including in posts falsely claiming she was a soldier fighting in Ukraine.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM:

Photos show the skeletal remains of giant humans who stood 7 meters (23 feet) in height.

AP’S ASSESSMENT:

False. These images show the fossilized remains of a species of tropical ground sloth, now extinct, that lived tens of thousands of years ago and was similar in size to an elephant. The bones are on display for the public at a museum in Ecuador.

THE FACTS:

The photos shared widely on Instagram and Twitter this week showed enormous, brown-tinged bones laid out on a wooden floor, with a group of people posing nearby.

Social media users claimed the creatures, whose spines appeared to extend past their legs and who had far more rib bones than people do, were an ancient species of giant human discovered in an Ecuadorian town.

“The remains of GIANTS were discovered in the small Equadorian village of Changaimina, 7m in height,” the posts read. “Connected to an ancient human race exceeding 12m.”

But there’s no evidence such a giant human species ever existed – and the images show the remains of giant sloths, not people.

“These are images of giant sloth fossils from the Tanque Loma asphaltic (‘tar pit’) paleontological locality in Ecuador,” Emily Lindsey, associate curator and excavation site director at the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum in Los Angeles, wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

A reverse image search confirms the photos were captured at the Museo Paleontological Megaterio at the Universidad Estatal Peninsula de Santa Elena in La Libertad, Ecuador, where these fossils are on display.

The species of tropical ground sloth featured in the photos, Eremotherium laurillardi, “was about the size of an elephant” and lived across Peru, Ecuador, Brazil, and up through Florida and the Gulf Coast during the late Pleistocene era, Lindsey said.

This and other ground sloth species have been extinct for thousands of years.

Lindsey said the online claims that the bones were discovered in Changaimina were also inaccurate.

“I looked it up on Google Maps and found that it is in the Andes mountains hundreds of miles southeast of the Peninsula where the fossils were found,” Lindsey said. “Eremotherium is a lowland species, no fossils have been found at high elevations.”

The AP has previously debunked the false claim that giant humans once existed, a myth that experts say has spread for “decades and decades” and occasionally has been perpetuated by fabricated images from Photoshop contests.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: The World Health Organization now says COVID-19 vaccines are “not recommended” for healthy children and teens.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. A WHO advisory group released new guidance that suggests countries prioritize continued COVID-19 vaccinations for those most at risk, such as older people and those with underlying health conditions. The group said countries should consider prioritizing vaccines against more threatening diseases for healthy young people, but it did not recommend against COVID-19 shots, which it said are safe and effective.

THE FACTS: The WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization met this month and updated its COVID-19 vaccine guidance. The revisions account for changing conditions, including the fact that many people now have either been infected, vaccinated or both.

But social media posts responding to the development wrongly suggested the WHO was now recommending against children and teens receiving COVID-19 vaccines — or conceding that young people never needed them.

“WHO now recommends healthy, young people NOT get the Covid Vaccines,” one tweet claims.

That misrepresents the updated guidance.

The WHO said in an announcement that the new guidance indicates that countries’ COVID-19 vaccine and boosting strategies should focus on those most at risk — such as older adults and those with underlying conditions.

“Countries should consider their specific context in deciding whether to continue vaccinating low risk groups, like healthy children and adolescents, while not compromising the routine vaccines that are so crucial for the health and well-being of this age group,” SAGE Chair Dr. Hanna Nohynek said in a statement.

In considering “the cost-effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccination,” the advisory group said, countries should ensure healthy children and teens receive traditional vaccines, such as those against rotavirus and measles. Still, it said, primary and booster COVID-19 shots are “safe and effective in children and adolescents.”

Dr. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, also confirmed the guidance isn’t advising against COVID-19 vaccines.

“I think it is critical to understand the actual context of the WHO guidance,” Adalja said in an email. “It is not that they are not recommending COVID-19 vaccinations for low risk children.”

Instead, he said, the guidance is stressing that, in places where resources might be constrained, vaccinating low-risk individuals against COVID-19 isn’t as important as vaccinating against more threatening childhood diseases.

The move is “entirely about cost-effectiveness and priorities,” Adalja said.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: California lawmakers are weighing a bill that would ban the Bible.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. A yearsold video being shared on social media discusses a 2018 bill proposed in the California State Assembly that has long been withdrawn and didn’t call for banning the Bible. It would have prohibited the discredited practice known as conversion therapy in the state. Leaders of the Democratic-controlled legislature also confirm there’s no bill currently before state lawmakers proposing to ban the Bible.

THE FACTS: Social media users are sharing a five-year-old video that claims California lawmakers have proposed legislation to ban the Bible in the nation’s most populous state.

The video features commentary from anti-LGBTQ activist Randy Thomasson,, founder of a Sacramento-based group called the Campaign for Children and Families. In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, he argued that the bill, AB-2943, would effectively outlaw books opposed to homosexuality.

“It’s very broad, very vague,” he says in the brief clip.

“THEY WANT TO BAN THE BIBLE????” an Instagram user who shared the video wrote in a post this week, along with dozens of hashtags including #bible #christianity #jesus #love #God.

But the bill in question isn’t currently pending in the California state legislature, as it was withdrawn during a legislative session nearly five years ago and never re-introduced, representatives for state lawmakers and a gay rights advocacy group confirmed.

Thomasson didn’t respond to a request for comment, but it’s clear his interview happened while the bill was being fiercely debated in 2018. A full version of it is posted on CBN’s YouTube page dated April 19, 2018.

Jorge Reyes Salinas, a spokesperson for Equality California, the state’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group, confirmed the interview was in response to the 2018 bill and not any proposal currently before state lawmakers.

Salinas also stressed the proposal didn’t ban the Bible, as Thomasson and other opponents falsely claimed at the time. Instead, it aimed to make advertising or selling conversion therapy, which is billed as a way to change a person’s sexual orientation, an unlawful and fraudulent business practice.

“It is unfortunate that false, dangerous claims like this one are resurfacing and fuel the current hate against the LGBTQ+ community,” Salinas wrote in an email.

In either case, the bill isn’t poised to become law anytime soon.

Assemblymember Evan Low withdrew the bill in September 2018 amid vocal opposition from religious groups. The following year, the legislature passed his non-binding resolution calling on faith leaders to embrace LGBTQ+ individuals and acknowledge the “psychological and other harms” of conversion therapy.

Low’s spokesperson Jiovanni Lieggi said Thursday that the Silicon Valley Democrat has no plans to reintroduce the proposal to outright ban the practice in California.

John Casey, a spokesperson for Democratic House Speaker Anthony Rendon, also confirmed there are no bills addressing conversion therapy — let alone seeking to ban the Bible — in the current legislative cycle.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A close-up photo shows Wikileaks founder Julian Assange looking physically unwell and disheveled in London’s Belmarsh prison.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. It’s a synthetic image, according to the creator, who posted it on Twitter. The Twitter user “The Errant Friend” told The Associated Press that it was created using Midjourney V5, an artificial intelligence text-to-image generator.

THE FACTS: Social media users are sharing the image of Assange with claims it’s a real photo of him in London’s high-security Belmarsh prison.

The image shows Assange with his eyes closed, red patches on his face, long hair and raggedy beard and mustache. Assange’s skin texture also looks slightly blurred and he appears to be wearing a bib that has yellow stains on it. There’s also a watermark over the image that reads: “Property of ‘E.’”

Social media users shared the photo on Twitter and Facebook saying it shows that being in prison had taken a toll on his health.

“A latest picture of Julian Assange! This is pure evil of what the US and UK are doing to this poor man!” one tweet that shared the image on Thursday states. It had received 4,000 likes by Saturday.

However, the image circulating online was generated using AI. It was posted on Twitter under the username “The Errant Friend,” who confirmed to the AP that it was not real.

“The Errant Friend,” who declined to give a real name for safety reasons, said the photo was produced using the latest update of Midjourney, version 5. The online tool allows users to generate images using simple text prompts, and the new iteration can produce convincing images mimicking real photos. Since its release last month, there has been a flood of realistic but entirely synthetic images of high profile figures on social media

Through Twitter direct messages, the user said the image was created to depict Assange’s “documented suffering in Belmarsh,” further adding that it was designed as “part of a viral movement for Julian’s freedom.” The user also provided the AP with a screenshot showing the text prompt on Midjourney.

Assange has been held in the high-security prison since 2019 on a series of charges related to WikiLeaks’ publication of a trove of classified U.S. documents more than a decade ago.

In June 2022, the British government ordered the extradition of Assange to the U.S. The following month he appealed that ruling and his lawyers have asked President Joe Biden to drop the charges against him. Assange’s supporters say his physical and mental health are both under strain. His wife, Stella Assange, told a news conference in 2022 that her husband’s condition was “deteriorating by the day,” according to AP reporting.

U.S. prosecutors have alleged that Assange helped U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal classified diplomatic cables and military files that WikiLeaks later published, putting lives at risk.

Assange’s supporters and lawyers maintain he was acting as a journalist and is entitled to First Amendment protections of freedom of speech, according to AP reporting. They argue that the case is politically motivated, that he would face inhumane treatment and be unable to get a fair trial in the U.S.

Barry Pollack, one of Assange’s U.S. lawyers, Stella Assange, his wife, and authorities at Belmarsh prison did not respond to the AP’s request for comment.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A video clip shows a genetically modified mosquito with a serial number on its body that has been released as part of an experiment funded by Bill Gates’ foundation.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The insect in the widely circulating video isn’t a mosquito but an aphid, a common garden insect. The black markings on the bug’s body are naturally occuring. Researchers, including some funded by the Gates Foundation, have however released genetically modified mosquitoes in limited experiments in recent years.

THE FACTS: Social media users are sharing a short video claiming to show a mosquito that’s been genetically altered and branded by scientists.

The clip features a person holding a tiny, long-legged insect in their hands and gently brushing back its wings to reveal black marks on the lower part of its body that resemble numbers.

“Since when do mosquitoes have #s stamped on them?” the text on the video reads.

The video then shows a portion of a 2016 press release with the headline “Gates Foundation Awards $35 million for Mosquito Research.”

“BILL GATES is to blame for releasing millions of GMO mosquitoes into the public.. the more you know,” wrote one Instagram user who shared the video clip in a post that’s been liked nearly 7,000 times as of Tuesday.

But insect experts agree the bug in the video clearly isn’t a mosquito and is most likely a winged aphid that tends to have black markings on its body.

Nora Besansky, a biology professor at the University of Notre Dame who specializes in mosquitoes, notes mosquitoes only have one pair of wings while the insect in the video has two pairs.

The bug also has a long, green rectangular abdomen that isn’t characteristic of a mosquito but of the aphid, which is common in Europe and is also found in North America, she said.

“Difficult to describe authoritatively without inspecting closely all diagnostic characteristics, but I’d bet 10,000 USD that it is *not* a mosquito,” Besansky wrote in an email. “I have worked on mosquitoes ever since before 1980, so this should give me some authority to say that we are NOT looking at a mosquito.”

Dina Fonseca, chair of the entomology department at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, was among a number of other insect experts that concurred.

She noted the insect in the video lacked a proboscis, which is the needle-like feeding tube a mosquito uses to suck blood from other organisms, and also had small red eyes, which are not characteristic of a mosquito.

“Mosquitoes are also covered in scales and quite fragile,” Fonseca wrote in an email “I doubt anyone would be able to mishandle them like that without wings and legs falling off.”

As to the black markings, those are commonly found on silver birch aphids, Fonseca and other experts agreed.

In any case, researchers don’t typically mark insects with serial numbers for tracking purposes, added Zach Adelman, a professor in the entomology department at Texas A&M University in College Station.

“There is just no way to do that (or reason to), since programs that involve the release of modified or sterile insects must produce and release millions of individuals per week,” he explained in an email.

Genetically modified mosquitoes were released in the Cayman Islands in 2010, Brazil in 2012 and most recently in Florida in 2021 as part of various research projects focused on curbing the spread of dengue and Zika viruses, malaria and other mosquito-borne illnesses, according to Adelman and other experts.

“To my knowledge, all of these trials have been heavily regulated, and none were associated with any negative outcomes,” he wrote in an email. “None of this should be shocking or surprising to anyone.”

In the Gates Foundation-funded project referenced in the social media posts, insects were tracked using a fluorescent powder that was dusted over them prior to their release, according to Naima Sykes, a manager for the project, known as Target Malaria.

The project involved the release of some 6,400 genetically-modified mosquitoes in Burkina Faso in 2019.

Sykes said the goal of the effort is to develop genetically modified mosquitoes that help reduce malaria transmission in sub-Saharan Africa, where 95% of malaria cases are concentrated.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: Rudy Giuliani has fired Alvin Bragg, Manhattan’s district attorney, for his “fake prosecution” of former President Donald Trump.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Giuliani is a former New York City mayor and U.S. attorney who has represented Trump; he has no authority to remove Bragg from his position. Under state law, a governor could initiate a process to remove a district attorney from office.

THE FACTS: A Manhattan grand jury has been hearing evidence about hush payments made on Trump’s behalf in 2016. Trump has said he expects to be arrested.

As the public waits to see whether Trump will be charged, which would mark the first criminal case against a former U.S. president, a Facebook video is touting the bogus claim that Bragg has been fired — by a Trump ally.

“Rudy Giuliani fires Alvin Bragg immediately for fake prosecution targeting Trump,” reads the large text over the video.

The video shows an interview between Newsmax host Eric Bolling and Giuliani, in which the former New York City mayor and Trump attorney criticizes Bragg. Giuliani calls the case a “political use of the awesome power of the criminal justice system.”

The interview clip itself never makes the claim that Bragg has been fired. And Giuliani, who was the city’s mayor until 2001 and U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York in the 1980s, has no authority to remove Bragg.

Richard Briffault, a Columbia Law School professor, told The Associated Press that in New York, it’s the governor who could potentially remove a district attorney — but not without following a process.

“The governor may remove a district attorney but before doing so the governor has to give to him or her a copy of the charges against him/her and an opportunity of being heard in his/her defense,” Briffault said in an email.

New York state law sets forth a process in which the governor can launch investigations and hearings into such public officers. Briffault said “there would have to be some formal process for the DA to defend himself.”

Giuliani’s son, Andrew Giuliani, pledged to remove Bragg during an unsuccessful run for governor last year.

Removing a district attorney would go against voters: Bragg is one of New York City’s five elected district attorneys.

A Democrat who took office in 2022, Bragg inherited a yearslong grand jury investigation into the money paid to two women who alleged that they had extramarital encounters with Trump. Trump has denied wrongdoing and the women’s accounts of his infidelity.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: It is a double standard that former President Donald Trump may be indicted over alleged hush money payments to a woman who accused him of sexual encounters, while former President Bill Clinton faced no criminal charges for paying a sexual harassment accuser $850,000.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Clinton and Trump’s cases have key differences, according to legal experts. Clinton’s $850,000 payment to Paula Jones in 1998 settled a civil lawsuit. The payment was public and legal, and the funds did not come from the government, nor did they amount to a campaign contribution. By comparison, the payment in Trump’s case was through a shell company and reimbursed by Trump, whose company logged the reimbursements as legal expenses in the final weeks of his 2016 presidential campaign.

THE FACTS: As a Manhattan grand jury weighs whether to indict Trump over hush money payments made on his behalf during his 2016 presidential campaign, social media users are spreading inaccurate comparisons of Trump’s case and one involving Clinton 25 years ago.

“Bill Clinton paid Paula Jones $850K to go away, I don’t remember the FBI raiding his lawyer’s office,” reads the text on a post being shared widely across social media this week.

“Rules for thee not for me,” wrote another Instagram user who shared the same post on Monday, receiving nearly 4,000 likes. Similar claims were also posted to Twitter by a Republican congressman.

But the claims draw a false comparison between the two cases.

“There is no comparison between these two payments from a legal point of view,” said Kathleen Clark, a law professor specializing in legal and government ethics at Washington University in St. Louis. “The 1998 Clinton-Jones settlement was a settlement of a civil lawsuit. And the settlement was public and was filed in court. In contrast, this payment from Trump to Stormy Daniels was secret.”

She added that another difference is that Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, pled guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws in connection to the payment. Cohen, now a key prosecution witness, has said Trump was involved as well.

“Trump’s payment was illegal, and later became the basis for a guilty plea and was part of an illegal campaign contribution,” Clark said.

Trump faces a possible indictment over his alleged involvement in the $130,000 payment made in 2016 to the porn actor Stormy Daniels to keep her from going public about a sexual encounter she said she had with him years earlier. Trump denies the encounter and any wrongdoing.

Cohen paid Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, through a shell company before being reimbursed by Trump, whose company, the Trump Organization, logged the reimbursements as legal expenses, The Associated Press has reported.

Cohen pleaded guilty to violating federal campaign finance law in connection with the payments. Federal prosecutors say the payments amounted to illegal, unreported assistance to Trump’s campaign, although they declined to file charges against the former president himself

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s team appears to be looking at whether Trump or anyone committed crimes in New York state in arranging the payments, or in the way they accounted for them at the Trump Organization, according to AP reporting.

Nan Hunter, a professor of law emerita at Georgetown University’s law school, said Bragg could potentially charge Trump with falsifying a business record because he has claimed that the money paid to Daniels was a legitimate business expense incurred by the Trump corporation.

“This charge is grounded in usage of corporate funds for a purpose unrelated to legitimate corporate activities, since the underlying issue was not conduct engaged in by the business but the personal actions of Mr. Trump,” Hunter wrote in an email. “In addition, there may be a charge that the purpose of the payment was to affect the outcome of an election through a secret payment in violation of election laws.”

Clinton, meanwhile, agreed to pay his accuser, Jones, $850,000 to drop a sexual harassment lawsuit. He settled out of court in November 1998, about halfway through his second term as president. As part of the settlement, he acknowledged no wrongdoing and offered no apology.

Jones alleged that Clinton, as Arkansas governor in 1991, made a crude advance in a room at a Little Rock hotel when she was a clerk for the Arkansas state government. Her lawsuit was later dismissed by a federal judge.

“Both involve payments for alleged sexual misconduct, but from a legal point of view there’s no comparison between the two,” Clark said. “There’s no indication that the 1998 Clinton-Jones settlement was aimed at influencing the election, in addition it was not secret, it was public.”

Hunter agreed that Clinton’s payment was legally sound. Clinton agreed to settle the case because Jones could have appealed the dismissal, according to Hunter. Under the terms of the settlement, Jones agreed not to appeal the judgment against her.

“There is nothing shady or illegal about two parties settling a case,” Hunter said, adding, “There was nothing secret about the payment and there were never any criminal charges in the case.”

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM:

The gay dating app Grindr says if Florida doesn’t stop passing homophobic and transphobic laws, it will reveal every Republican legislator and party official who secretly uses the app.

AP’S ASSESSMENT:

False. This claim originated on a satirical account. A spokesperson for Grindr denounced anti-LGBTQ legislation while confirming the app “protects the privacy of all its users.”

THE FACTS:

A popular dating app for the gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community isn’t threatening to expose the identities of its high-profile Republican users, despite widely shared posts claiming otherwise.

Facebook and Twitter users were spreading the claim as real after a Twitter account posted it Wednesday. The Twitter account that initially posted the claim identifies its content as “halfway true content and satire.”

The claim that Grindr said it would expose users reached thousands of likes and shares across social platforms, with some commenters saying they supported the idea.

But a spokesperson for the app confirmed it was unfounded in an email to The Associated Press.

“This claim is false,” said Grindr spokesperson Patrick Lenihan. “Grindr protects the privacy of all its users. Anti-LGBTQ legislation is abominable and cruel, and we vehemently condemn any laws that restrict, deny, or abolish the rights of LGBTQ people.”

Grindr has previously faced criticism and been fined for sharing personal data with third parties that could potentially identify users. The privacy policy on the company’s website outlines how it uses and aims to protect user data. It adds that its goal “is to put you in control of as much of the Personal Information that you share within the Grindr Properties as possible.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is moving to ban classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in all grades, expanding the controversial law that critics call “Don’t Say Gay.”

The state’s Republican-led legislature also has proposed a range of laws related to gender and sexuality, including legislation that would ban discussion of periods and other human sexuality topics in elementary grades.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A photo of a man with a bloody face shows Lagos State House of Assembly candidate Olumide Oworu after his team was attacked while campaigning in March 2023.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. This image is from 2022 and shows Oworu in special effects makeup on a film set. While Oworu has said a member of his team was injured in an attack in March 2023, this photo doesn’t show the injury.

THE FACTS: The Labour Party candidate for a House of Assembly seat in Nigeria’s Lagos state became the subject of false claims this week, shortly before he hopes to win the office in Saturday’s elections.

The misinformation began after Oworu, who was a popular Nigerian actor before his candidacy, tweeted on Thursday that his team was attacked while campaigning earlier in the week.

“My team and I were attacked on Tuesday as we attempted to campaign at Iponri, Surulere,” he wrote. “A member of my team was injured, but we are thankful the incident didn’t escalate past the level it was. The case has been reported at the Iponri police station.”

Oworu added in a follow-up tweet that he was “not deterred” by the incident and would continue campaigning through Surulere Constituency 1, the district where he is running.

In the hours after Oworu’s announcement, social media users began sharing an image of the candidate in a white shirt and black tie, his face covered in caked-on blood. The posts together amassed thousands of shares.

“This is the LP candidate Olumide Oworu challenging Desmond Elliot in Surulere, Lagos,” one Twitter user wrote with the image. “He was att@cked by Tinubu #APC thugs and security agencies aren’t doing anything about it. That’s the Nigeria they want.”

However, a reverse-image search shows the image predates the alleged attack, and was captured on a film set for a Nigerian movie called “On the Edge.”

A special effects artist posted the image with a series of photos on Instagram in October 2022, showing how she mimicked the progression of a swollen eye using prosthetic makeup on Oworu.

Oworu posted the image on his own account a few days earlier, captioning the shot, “Alagbado John Wick #OnTheEdge.”

The details of Tuesday’s alleged attack were unclear, and Oworu’s campaign and a police spokesman didn’t immediately respond to calls for comment.

Local press reported on a separate attack on Labour Party supporters in Surulere on Thursday, injuring some party members.

The ruling All Progressives Congress party candidate, Desmond Elliot, released a statement on Facebook condemning attacks on Labour Party supporters in Surulere.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: Photos of the Statue of Liberty from 1898 and 2017 show that sea levels have not risen significantly.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Sea level rise in the New York City area as well as globally has been documented by scientific bodies. The comparison of the two photos is misleading because it doesn’t account for tidal fluctuations, experts say.

THE FACTS: Posts falsely suggesting that side-by-side photos of Liberty Island show that sea level rise is a myth have spread across social media platforms including Twitter and TikTok in recent days.

The posts feature a black and white photo of the Statue of Liberty dated 1898, as well as a color photo of the statue from a slightly different angle supposedly dated 2017. The water levels are similar in both photos.

“This is what catastrophic sea level rise actually looks like,” one Twitter user wrote on March 14 in a tweet that was shared over 17,000 times. Similarly, an Instagram user shared an image of the tweet on Wednesday and wrote in reference to the climate change activist Greta Thunberg, “@gretathunberg what do you think about this?”

The posts are misleading, experts say. Sea level rise has been well documented in the New York City area and globally.

The global average sea level has risen 8 to 9 inches, or 203-228 millimeters, since 1880, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, while NASA estimates that the average sea level has risen roughly 3.8 inches, about 96.7 millimeters, since 1993. And the sea level at The Battery on the southern tip of Manhattan, around 1.7 miles from Liberty Island, has risen at a rate of almost a foot, or 304.8 millimeters, per 100 years, according to NOAA.

“The rise of sea level globally of 3.3 mm/yr and locally in New York of 4.5 mm/yr is a fact documented by satellite and tide gauge data,” Kenneth G. Miller, distinguished professor and graduate program director at the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Rutgers, wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

The black and white photo in the social media posts is dated 1898, according to Getty Images. A reverse image search shows that the color image supposedly dated 2017 has been online since at least 2013.

But the two photos don’t provide an accurate representation of how sea levels have changed over time because tidal cycles affect water levels, experts say.

“Tidal variability is like 5 feet or so in this area,” said Jacqueline Austermann, an assistant professor at Columbia University who studies sea level change. “Depending on what time of the day this picture was taken, you could have tens of centimeters difference just because of tidal variability.”

Comparing such photos is “not really a useful comparison” to demonstrate sea level change, she added.

“What these pictures don’t show is the tide height when these pictures were taken,” Jennie Lyons, a spokesperson for NOAA, wrote in an email to the AP. “Mean sea level, which is based upon long term averages not aliased by tide or weather, is the best way to measure long term changes.”

Lyons noted that the long-term rate of relative sea level rise in the New York City region has been roughly 3 millimeters per year, or one foot per 100 years. This rate is accelerating, with about a half-foot of rise occurring between 1970 and 2020, and the region is expected to experience as much as another foot of sea level rise in the next 30 years, she wrote.

Similar misleading photo comparisons have previously circulated online, such as photos of Fort Denison in Australia’s Sydney Harbor.

Sea levels have risen due to warming oceans and melting ice over land caused by climate change.

The U.S. coastline will see sea levels rise in the next 30 years by as much as they did in the entire 20th century, with major Eastern cities hit regularly with costly floods even on sunny days, according to a 2022 report by NOAA and six other federal agencies. One study asserted that sea level rise caused by climate change added $8 billion in damage during 2012’s Superstorm Sandy that struck New York and surrounding areas.

“The rise of sea-level in the past century is insidious because it is slow, but the total effects add up,” Miller wrote.

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This story has been updated to clarify NOAA’s estimate of sea level rise at The Battery.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A video of a caravan of cars filling the streets outside Trump Tower in New York City shows supporters of former U.S. President Donald Trump protesting his possible indictment in March 2023.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The clip was taken on Oct. 4, 2020, at a show of support for Trump after the former president tested positive for COVID-19.

THE FACTS: Following a weekend Truth Social post in which Trump claimed that his arrest is imminent and beseeched his supporters to protest, social media users began sharing an old video, falsely suggesting that they had already begun.

“Trump supporters have shut down 5th Ave in NYC right outside Trump Tower,” states one tweet sharing that clip posted a day after Trump’s initial Saturday announcement on Truth Social. The tweet had received nearly 15,000 likes and nearly 5,000 shares as of Monday.

In the clip, a mass of honking vehicles, most sporting Trump flags, the American flag or both, can be seen on New York City’s Fifth Avenue.

It is not clear who first posted the video, but it matches a news photo taken on Oct. 4, 2020, as supporters rallied for Trump while he was hospitalized for COVID-19. About 100 vehicles drove in from Long Island that day and stopped traffic on Fifth Avenue for about 30 minutes, according to local news reports.

A man wrapped in a red Trump 2020 flag, as well as a man in a red shirt and an American flag hat, can be seen about 15 seconds into the video spreading on social media, on the left side of the shot. They also appear in a photo published on Oct. 4, 2020, in a New York Post article about the rally.

Other elements of the video also suggest it was not taken in March nor 2023. For instance, the trees are covered in green leaves. And a city bus captured about 20 seconds into the clip is advertising “The Comey Rule,” a Showtime miniseries starring Brendan Gleeson as Trump that aired in late September 2020.

Trump’s Truth Social post came as a New York grand jury investigates hush money payments to women who alleged sexual encounters with the former president. Although law enforcement officials in New York City are making security preparations for a possible indictment, Trump’s appeals have so far generated mostly muted reactions from his supporters.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

CLAIM: A study published in The Lancet proves that COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are increasing people’s chances of contracting the disease after seven months, providing further evidence that people should not get vaccinated.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: Misleading. The observational study out of Qatar found that people who received a booster shot with the original vaccine formulation had overall lower rates of infection than those with only two doses over the course of a year. It also found those who were boosted were 75% less likely to experience severe COVID-19. The report did find higher infection rates among the boosted specifically after seven months, but outside experts said the study doesn’t doesn’t prove the vaccines are biologically increasing recipients’ risk of infection.

THE FACTS: Florida’s Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo cited the study Thursday while suggesting that no one should be receiving the widely used mRNA shots.

It was the latest in a continuing campaign against public health measures fighting the coronavirus: U.S. health agencies recently sent Ladapo a letter warning him that his claims about vaccine risks are harmful to the public.

While speaking at a press conference with Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who appointed Ladapo in 2021, the surgeon general claimed that the mRNA vaccines “have a terrible safety profile” and said he was “not sure anyone should be taking them” anymore.

He went on to say the study in The Lancet showed protection from infection around 70% plummeting within seven months to “the other side of the axis, right, so it is negative and that continues.”

“And the magnitude of that negativity increases over time,” Ladapo continued. “What does that mean, folks? It literally means that the people who received that vaccine were more likely to contract COVID-19 after seven months than the people who did not. That is a fact.”

Nikki Whiting, a Florida Health Department spokesperson, said Ladapo’s point was that most people have some existing immunity from COVID-19 from a prior infection and that the study’s finding concerning negative immunity months later means that “risk of infection is higher.”

But lead study author Hiam Chemaitelly, a researcher at Weill Cornell Medicine – Qatar, said in an email that Ladapo’s remarks were “a mischaracterization of our findings.”

The study did not compare people who were vaccinated versus those who were unvaccinated, Chemaitelly said, as Ladapo’s comments may have suggested. She said her study showed that booster doses “remain essential particularly for the elderly and those with comorbidities to protect them against severe COVID-19.”

The researchers found that individuals who received a booster shot “were 75% less likely to experience severe COVID-19 compared to those who remained with only the two-dose primary series,” Chemaitelly said. The study looked at boosters using the old formulation, not the newer, omicron-targeting booster shots that better match the strain of the virus now circulating.

During the overall year-long follow-up period, those who received a booster dose tested positive for COVID-19 less than people with only two doses.

But there was a caveat: After month seven, those who received the booster shot had a higher incidence of infection than those with only two doses — the finding that Lapado homed in on.

The authors suggested that finding may be due to a biological phenomenon. In short, they theorized that the increased infection totals among the boosted may be because their immune systems were attempting to fight new variants by targeting the old form of the virus used in the original vaccines.

While the study’s authors stood by their theory, four independent experts told the AP they believe that the study can’t reliably draw such conclusions because of its inability to control for different factors.

The study was observational, meaning it relied on existing data about vaccinations and testing to compare the groups of people who received two doses and three doses.

“You have to make sure those two groups are alike in all other aspects so that the only variable between those two groups is the receipt of a booster dose,” said Dr. Paul Offit, a national vaccine expert at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, otherwise the results may be skewed.

Those who seek out a third or fourth dose may be more vulnerable — elderly or immunocompromised, for example. “You’re likely selecting for a group that may be more likely to get sick,” Offit added.

Matt Hitchings, an infectious disease epidemiologist and professor of biostatistics at the University of Florida, said the group behind the study “has done a lot to enhance our understanding of vaccine effectiveness” but said they did not prove that a biological increased infection risk was actually occurring.

“I do think, in this case, that they have not done enough to be clear about other possible explanations for the pattern that they’re seeing,” he added.

Dr. Otto Yang, a professor of medicine, microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles, similarly pointed out the biases of such studies.

“There are reasons why certain people would be boosted or not boosted, and how often they get tested…and those factors certainly will affect how much risk for infection they face, and how efficiently an asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic infection would be diagnosed or not diagnosed,” he said.

Spencer Fox, an assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Georgia, said in an email: “The negative effectiveness following initial immunity could be caused by many other factors, including behavioral differences between the populations (e.g. if people with 3 vaccines acted riskier because of their perceived protection).”

The focus on the infection rates misses the point that the vaccines’ most important feature is their ability to help protect people from getting seriously ill or dying, Offit said, which has been proven repeatedly. Asymptomatic and mild infections will continue to occur regardless because the virus is not going away.

“The notion that we don’t need to give vaccines anymore is irresponsible and ill-founded,” he added.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.