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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Health & medicine fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about health & medicine. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

13,674 published reviews in this topic

Fact Crescendo Sri LankaHealth & medicine

FACT CHECK: කළුබෝවිල රෝහලේ හා නැගෙනහිර කොළඹ මූලික රෝහලේ ඔක්සිජන් හිඟයේ ඇත්ත කතාව!

Publisher’s rating: Misleading

The review investigates reports circulating in April 2021 that COVID-19 patients at Kalubowila Teaching Hospital faced an oxygen-cylinder shortage, and a separate social-media version claiming a shortage at the Eastern Colombo Base Hospital in Mulleriyawa. It traces the Kalubowila claim to a newspaper report that said the hospital had about 80 cylinders against a daily need of 150. The review also says a report based on that story had been edited to make it appear that Mulleriyawa had a shortage too. To check the claims, the review reports consulting a health-services official, referring to a Health Ministry statement, and contacting Mulleriyawa’s director. The official said there was no oxygen shortage at either hospital; the ministry likewise said there was no shortage of oxygen needed for COVID-19 patients and called the report false. Mulleriyawa’s director said that hospital had not experienced an oxygen-shortage problem. He explained that it ordinarily brought in oxygen twice daily and had requested additional supplies in advance, rather than reporting a special shortage. The review’s conclusion is that reports of an existing shortage at either hospital were false at the time it examined them. It also records an important qualification: the Ministry acknowledged limited hospital and treatment-unit capacity, and the review describes increased oxygen demand among patients with breathing difficulties. That context indicates pressure on health services, but the evidence presented does not establish the claimed oxygen shortage at these two hospitals.

FACTLYHealth & medicine

RSS has built India’s second-largest Covid care centre in Indore, Madhya Pradesh

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns the Maa Ahilya COVID Care Centre in Indore, Madhya Pradesh: it says RSS built the centre, described in the social-media post as having capacity for 6,000 people, along with four oxygen plants. The review instead reports that the Madhya Pradesh government built the centre on land belonging to Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), a spiritual organisation distinct from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). It says RSSB has no political or commercial affiliations.

BBC Reality CheckHealth & medicine

"We've done 50% of the population and 25% of the adult population have now had two doses [of vaccine]"

Publisher’s rating: These figures are correct.

The claim concerned Boris Johnson’s statement at Prime Minister’s Questions that half the UK population had received a first vaccine dose and a quarter of adults had received two doses. The BBC’s review compared those proportions with government figures, rather than treating them as figures it had independently collected. For the first-dose claim, the review cites government figures dated 27 April: more than 33.8 million people in the UK had received a first dose. It says this was “about half of the population,” supporting the stated proportion. For the second-dose claim, the review reports that the Department of Health said on the Tuesday in question that 13.2 million UK adults had received both doses. It describes this as “more than a quarter of adults in the UK,” supporting the second proportion. The excerpt gives rounded proportions and counts, rather than exact percentages; the review’s conclusion applies to the two comparisons as stated.

ComprovaHealth & medicine

Senado da Itália aprova uso de medicamentos para tratamento imediato contra o covid-19 através de protocolo único

Publisher’s rating: ENGANOSO: O Senado italiano decidiu em 8 de abril pela criação de um protocolo único para atendimentos domiciliares de pessoas infectadas pela covid-19. Uma postagem do deputado Eduardo Bolsonaro no Facebook celebra a aprovação na Itália do uso de medicamentos para um "tratamento imediato" para a covid-19, o que aproximaria a decisão italiana do "tratamento precoce" defendido por alguns médicos e políticos no Brasil. Mas os protocolos são diferentes.

FACTLYHealth & medicine

Image of a dead mother being carried by her son and husband on a bike due to unavailability of an ambulance amid India’s COVID-19 related Oxygen crisis

Publisher’s rating: MISLEADING

The claim attached the image of a dead woman being carried on a motorcycle by her son and husband to India’s COVID-19 oxygen crisis, alleging that an ambulance was unavailable. FACTLY’s review says the image instead shows an earlier incident at Purnia Sadar Hospital in Bihar, where the family was denied a mortuary van—not an ambulance—and the death was unrelated to COVID-19. FACTLY describes using a reverse image search, which led to a Hindustan Times article dated 4 June 2017. That article, as summarized by FACTLY, reported that the woman’s son and husband had taken her to Purnia Sadar Hospital after returning from Punjab, where they were wage labourers. She died of her illness, and they carried her body on a bike after being denied a mortuary van. FACTLY says another news article also confirmed the 2017 incident. The review distinguishes this old image from the separate oxygen shortage that India was experiencing amid rising COVID-19 cases. It notes that patients had died because of unavailable medical oxygen in some states, but concludes that this image cannot document that crisis: the pictured event occurred in 2017, before the pandemic.

dpaHealth & medicine

Il n’y a pas eu d’épidémie.

Publisher’s rating: Cette affirmation est complètement fausse : le coronavirus a engendré une pandémie, puisque l’épidémie partie de Chine s’est étendu à tous les continents. Elle est également encore actuelle car le nombre de cas est toujours en fluctuation (en date du 26.04.2021).