MARY ALEXANDER • 18 JULY 2024

“It turns out that the World Health Organization, in its founding document (1946), EXEMPTED itself from criminal prosecution,” reads a claim circulating on social media in South Africa and elsewhere since 8 July 2024.*

It includes a one-minute video of UK comedian and known conspiracist Russell Brand interviewing US financial analyst and known conspiracist David Martin.

Brand asks Martin why he claims the WHO is a “criminal cartel” and “how the events of the last few years somehow demonstrate or at least utilise that”.

Martin responds: “In the founding document of the World Health Organization, they gave themselves the right to be exempt from all criminal prosecution of any kind whatsoever.”

He adds: “Why would an organisation need to give itself exemption from criminal prosecution? This is not civil prosecution, this is criminal prosecution …”

The reason “they wrote that into their founding charter”, Martin says, “is because they knew they were already breaking the law”.

Throughout the video, a clipped page of the WHO’s supposed “founding document” is displayed on screen as proof of Martin’s claim. It includes a URL to the page https://apps.who.int/gb/bd/pdf_files/BD_49th-en.pdf#page=34. That’s page 34.

The page is headed: “CONVENTION ON PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES. Article V – Representatives of Members”.

It reads:

Representatives of members at meetings convened by a specialized agency shall, while exercising their functions and during their journeys to and from the place of meeting, enjoy the following privileges and immunities:
(a) Immunity from personal arrest or detention and from seizure of their personal baggage, and in respect of words spoken or written and all acts done by them in their official capacity, immunity from legal process of every kind;

But the page isn’t part of the WHO’s “founding document”, and doesn’t “exempt” the WHO from “criminal prosecution”.

Convention passed by UN general assembly in 1947

If Martin had looked just four pages up to https://apps.who.int/gb/bd/pdf_files/BD_49th-en.pdf#page=30 (that’s page 30) he would have found that the section of text he refers to is not the WHO’s “founding document”.

Instead, it’s the text of a United Nations treaty, the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the Specialized Agencies, adopted by the UN general assembly on 21 November 1947.

The treaty applies to all of the UN’s 17 specialised agencies. The WHO is just one of those 17.

The others include the Food and Agriculture Organization, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the International Seabed Authority, the International Telecommunication Union and the World Meteorological Organization.

All the treaty does is grant what is essentially diplomatic immunity to representatives of the UN’s specialised agencies, as international organisations. This means that officials from one country who travel to or live in another country are not subject to the laws of the second country. It is an ancient principle of international law.

The PDF Martin refers to is also not the WHO’s “founding document”. It’s simply a collection of essential WHO texts put together under the title “Basic Documents.”. It includes the WHO’s constitution, agreements with other intergovernmental organisations, rules and regulations, and more.

By “the events of the last few years”, Brand is clearly referring to the Covid pandemic. Both he and Martin are proponents of the disproved “plandemic” conspiracy theory, which holds that the pandemic was somehow planned by the WHO and other shadowy elites.

But in the video, Martin doesn’t explain how the WHO was “already breaking the law” back in 1947.

If the treaty text Martin refers to is proof that the WHO is a “criminal cabal”, then all other UN agencies are too – including, for example, the International Seabed Authority.

Read more: Russell Brand – Confidence man

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

Published by Africa Check on 13 August 2024

The post No ‘founding document’ gives WHO exemption from ‘criminal prosecution’ appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 18 JULY 2024

After no single political party won a clear majority in South Africa’s 29 May 2024 elections, the African National Congress (ANC) invited other parties to form a government of national unity.

The ANC scored 40.2% of the national vote and the main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) 21.8%. The newcomer uMkhonto weSizwe Party, which declined to join the unity government, was third with 14.6%.

The DA also retained government of the Western Cape province.

ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa announced his new unity cabinet on 30 June, with 20 of the 32 ministerial posts going to the ANC, six to the DA and six to smaller parties.

The DA’s Leon Schreiber was appointed minister of home affairs, a national department that maintains the population register and issues identity documents.

Days later, a screenshot of an odd X post seemingly by Alan Winde, the DA premier of the Western Cape, went viral on social media.*

“The DA now controls the Dept. of Home Affairs,” it reads. “Get your Digital & Medical ID at these Bank Branches. We will be prepared when the next pandemic arrives.”

It appears to have been posted on the X account @AlanWinde666, with the name Premier Alan Winde, and its profile pic shows the premier. It links to an article on banks that process ID applications.

The screenshot has been posted with – and has attracted – outraged comments. These include:

• “The DA is selling us out to the Globalists…”
• “The DA is part of the New World Order […] Things are going to get very tough by 2025 more and more freedoms being taken away.”
• “This is the same guy who was forcing vaccine down the throats of people of western cape. Now he already know there is another pandemic coming […]”
• “What is a Medical ID? And the 666 on Alan’s name. A coincidence too neh? June is in July with this GNU gig! […] COVIS was a test phase for Hell on Earth?”
• “When we said these things will happen they thought we were smoking dirty socks […] that’s your next plandemic….New world order loading…”

But did the DA’s Western Cape premier really post this?

No digital or medical IDs in South Africa

The handle of Winde’s verified X account is simply @alanwinde, not @AlanWinde666. That handle belongs to an account named, in full, Premier Alan Winde Western Cape Parody.

On the screenshot, the words “Western Cape Parody” are obscured by the follow button.

The account’s bio reads: “Sith Lord. Woke Dick-tator of WEFtern Cape DICTATORIAL Alliance. Free PALPATINE. Only an unelected one world government can save us!” It then adds: “Parody”.

Its banner is made up of images where “un” has been added to the DA’s name, to read “Undemocratic Alliance”. The images include the URL for YesCape.org, a website that promotes the secession of the Western Cape from South Africa.

And the account’s current pinned post reads, in part: “We take orders from our globalist masters (WEF and WHO), support lockdowns and vaxxine mandates, promote gender fluidity in your kids, back Ukraine (US proxy wars), promote the climate hoax and will do anything to avoid referendums.”

@AlanWinde666 published the X post in the viral screenshot on 2 July. It has been viewed some 13,500 times so far – and attracted many more outraged comments.

South Africa has two types of ID document: the old green ID book and the newer smart ID card. There is no such thing as a South African “digital ID” or “medical ID”.

Parody and satire are meant to poke fun at political and other opponents, but not mislead about those opponents’ statements. And when parody or satire is reposted as fact, it becomes disinformation.

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

Published by Africa Check on 6 August 2024

The post ‘Pandemic’ post from ‘parody’ Cape independence X account, not South Africa’s Western Cape DA premier Alan Winde appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 21 MAY 2024
Published by Africa Check on 29 May 2024

“BREAKING: South Africa signs new Global WHO Pandemic Treaty,” reads a screenshot of an X/Twitter post circulating on social media since 10 May 2024.*

“International health regulations are more important than South Africa’s sovereignty and I fully support this essential development to ensure our future medical safety and vaccine readiness,” it continues.

In the screenshot, the name of the X account posting the message is Premier Alan Winde.

The pandemic treaty, also known as the pandemic agreement or pandemic accord, has been negotiated by the World Health Organisation’s 194 member states for over two years.

Its aim is to “prevent, prepare for and respond to pandemics”. The need for the treaty came out of the world’s lack of preparation before the global Covid outbreak and poor cooperation between countries during it.

But there have been concerns that the agreement would force nations to abandon their sovereignty, giving the WHO the global power to declare lockdowns, impose travel bans, force vaccines on people and more.

Sovereignty means a government has full control of its country’s affairs without outside control.

Alan Winde is the premier of the Western Cape, the only province out of South Africa’s nine to be governed by the Democratic Alliance (DA).

The other eight are under South Africa’s majority African National Congress (ANC).

The country is set to hold national and provincial elections on 29 May, in a year that marks three decades of ANC national government.

Other major contenders in the elections, said to be the most important since 1994, are the Economic Freedom Fighters, the uMkhonto weSizwe Party and the Inkatha Freedom Party.

‘ANC and DA devil’s alliance’

The X post has angered many social media users. Several suggest that the DA, the country’s largest opposition party, is secretly working with the ANC.

The screenshot has been posted with comments such as:

• After you Vote for ANC/DA they will bring back Covid. Vote them and suffer again.
• This is what Anc And DA devil’s alliance think of you.
• ANC and DA voters I hope you guys are aware of this.
• The ANC and DA both deny being in partnership with each other but it’s funny how everything sorded agenda that the ANC passes the DA fully supports!
• Basically ALL political parties are saying F@ck your sovereignty. Who are you Alan Winde to speak for me?

But is the X post really by the DA’s Alan Winde? And has South Africa’s ANC government really signed the WHO-coordinated pandemic agreement?

‘Woke Dick-tator of WEFtern Cape DICKTATORIAL Alliance’

The screenshot obscures the full name of the X account: Premier Alan Winde Western Cape Parody.

Here’s the original post, still live on X:

BREAKING: South Africa signs new Global WHO Pandemic Treaty – International health regulations are more important than South Africa’s sovereignty and I fully support this essential development to ensure our future medical safety and vaccine readiness. pic.twitter.com/f790YBzouz

— Premier Alan Winde Western Cape Parody (@AlanWinde666) May 10, 2024

A parody is an exaggerated impersonation of someone, often meant as satire.

But when satire and parody are presented as fact, they become disinformation.

The account’s handle is @AlanWinde666. Its bio reads: “Woke Dick-tator of WEFtern Cape DICKTATORIAL Alliance . Cape INDEPENDENCE will fail! Evil will always triumph, because parody is dumb!”

A search of Winde’s verified X account, with the handle @alanwinde, confirms that the post is not his.

More than this, South Africa can’t have signed the pandemic agreement because it’s still a draft, yet to be finalised. It would be impossible for any country to sign a draft treaty.

And as Africa Check explained more than a year ago, the pandemic agreement doesn’t require countries to hand their sovereignty over to the WHO. Any laws that might come out of it would have to be passed by individual countries.

The pandemic agreement, still bogged down in negotiations, is simply an attempt to prepare all countries of the world for another global disease outbreak.

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

The post South Africa hasn’t signed WHO pandemic treaty – X post from parody account and treaty remains a draft appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 21 MAY 2024
Published by Africa Check on 6 June 2024

“AstraZaneca Covid 19 vaccine withdrawn worldwide after manufacturers admitted it can cause dangerous side effect,” reads a claim circulating on social media in Ghana and elsewhere in May 2024.*

The vaccine was developed at the UK’s Oxford University in the first year of the Covid pandemic, in collaboration with the pharma company AstraZeneca. Its generic name is ChAdOx1-S and its brand names Covishield and Vaxzevria.

It’s been used in more than 100 countries across the world, with some 3 billion jabs given. In February 2021 the West African country of Ghana was the first on the continent to roll out, under the Covax facility, what was then known as the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine.

Many versions of the claim use a graphic showing a vial of vaccine and the text: “AstraZeneca Covid vaccine withdrawn worldwide, months after its manufacturers admitted the vaccine can cause a rare and dangerous side effect.”

The graphic includes the logo of TV3 Ghana, while the text is credited to the Telegraph, a UK newspaper. In Ghana, it’s been posted with comments such as:

• Do you even know the type of vaccine administered to you? That’s why I never tried that madness.
• A Woe Generation.Wicked men at the TOP…When God warns,people won’t listen.A generation who trust scientists,elits more than the Almighty God.
• It took them 4 years of arrogance and self enrichment to finally admit they’ve killed and caused long lasting life defects to billions of people. The health sector needs a change.

Other versions of the claim link to the Telegraph article.

When it was first published on 7 May, the article’s headline read: “AstraZeneca withdrawing Covid vaccine, months after admitting rare side effect.”

It’s since been altered to read: “AstraZeneca withdrawing Covid vaccine worldwide.” No reason for the change is given.

Some online users have taken the claim further, saying that the vaccine has been withdrawn due to a “rare and severe side effect”.

The claim can also be seen here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

AstraZeneca has withdrawn its Covid vaccine, voluntarily. And the vaccine does have a rare and sometimes fatal side effect.

But the side effect, which the company has acknowledged for years, has nothing to do with the vaccine’s withdrawal.

Side effect identified in 2021, noted in package inserts

The AstraZeneca vaccine’s most severe side effect is thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, or TTS. Thrombosis is a blood clot in the blood vessels or the heart, which can lead to stroke, heart attack or an embolism in the lungs. Thrombocytopenia is a low platelet count in the blood.

TTS is rare, occurring in two to three people for every 100,000 who got the jab. When it has occurred, it has led to death in a range from 5% to 50% of cases.

On the other hand, it’s been independently estimated that the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine saved more than 6 million lives during its first year of use.

In April 2024 the Telegraph reported that “AstraZeneca admits its Covid vaccine can cause rare side effect in court documents for first time”.

But this is misleading. All it says is that AstraZeneca has acknowledged the TTS side effect for the first time in court documents.

The company is currently facing a class action suit in the UK from families of people who have died from TTS, and others who claim to have been disabled by the vaccine.

AstraZeneca’s submission was made to the UK high court in February. The Telegraph quotes it:

It is admitted that the AZ vaccine can, in very rare cases, cause TTS. The causal mechanism is not known. Further, TTS can also occur in the absence of the AZ vaccine (or any vaccine). Causation in any individual case will be a matter for expert evidence.

TTS was first identified as a possible side effect of the AstraZeneca vaccine in March and April 2021. This was after the conclusion of the vaccine’s clinical trials, which tested it on some 60,000 people.

From April 2021 warnings about TTS as a side effect were included in package inserts and other patient information about the vaccine – here, here, here, here, here and here. It was also mentioned in AstraZeneca’s 2021 annual report.

The company has acknowledged the side effect since it was first identified three years ago.

Outcompeted and outdated

In March 2024 AstraZeneca applied to have the vaccine’s European Union marketing authorisation withdrawn, which was approved on 7 May. The vaccine is no longer manufactured or sold, and has been withdrawn across the world.

The vaccine was developed to combat the original Wuhan strain of the coronavirus and has not been updated. This means it is less effective against new variants of the virus. South Africa, for example, withdrew it in early 2021 because it gave little protection against the mutated Beta variant of the virus, then dominant in the country.

In a May 2024 statement, AstraZeneca said: “As multiple, variant Covid-19 vaccines have since been developed, there is a surplus of available updated vaccines. This has led to a decline in demand for Vaxzevria.”

Several experts have backed this up, saying that with lower demand for Covid vaccines and more effective options available, AstraZeneca no longer has any commercial reason to manufacture and distribute the jab.

AstraZeneca has withdrawn its vaccine because it’s out of date and can’t compete, not because of the long-identified TTS side effect.

The vaccine has been a target of misinformation from the start – and to the end.

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

The post AstraZeneca Covid vaccine withdrawn because it’s outdated – not for ‘dangerous side effect’ appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 17 MAY 2024
Published by Africa Check on 22 May 2024

“The WHO has abandoned its contentious Pandemic Treaty following public discourse and backlash,” reads a claim circulating on social media in South Africa and elsewhere since late April 2024.*

For more than two years the 194 member states of the World Health Organization have been negotiating a draft pandemic agreement, also known as the pandemic accord or pandemic treaty. Its simple objective is to “prevent, prepare for and respond to pandemics”.

The need for the agreement came from the lack of preparedness for the global Covid outbreak and poor international cooperation during it. Another concern was that people in wealthier countries were given tests, treatment and vaccines far more quickly than people in poorer countries.

The first step was in March 2021, when 25 world leaders – including South African president Cyril Ramaphosa – announced that “nations should work together towards a new international treaty for pandemic preparedness and response”.

“The main goal of this treaty would be to foster an all of government and all of society approach, strengthening national, regional and global capacities and resilience to future pandemics,” they said.

These leaders then took the idea to the WHO, the only organisation that directs and coordinates international health work. In December 2021 the international negotiating body (INB) was set up to draft, debate and finalise the agreement.

The first version, the “zero draft” of the agreement, was published in February 2023.

Since then there have been concerns and conspiracy theories in South Africa and across the world that the agreement would give global power to the WHO, allowing it to lock down countries, impose travel bans, force vaccines on people and more.

But none of this is true, as Africa Check explained earlier in May 2023. The agreement, when adopted, would be entirely voluntary and any laws that came out of it could only be passed by member states themselves.

Comments on the recent claim that the agreement has been “abandoned” include:

• Wow, we won one, nice work Humanity.
• This is really good news, if true, because by signing the contract Treaty, governments would be surrendering to WHO (NWO) control.
• I love it when we win.

It can also be seen here, here, here, here and here.

Has the WHO really “abandoned” the “contentious” pandemic agreement after a “backlash” by the public?

‘Getting this done means getting it right’

Work on the pandemic agreement continues. The most recent draft is dated 22 March 2024 and publicly available on the WHO website.

From 29 April to 10 May the INB resumed its ninth meeting to negotiate the agreement. The session’s proceedings, including documents and video of the discussions, can again be seen on the WHO website.

No final agreement came out of the meeting.

But in a 10 May press release, the INB said member states had agreed to continue working on the agreement and refining its draft ahead of the annual World Health Assembly, to be held from 27 May to 1 June.

“This is not a simple exercise,” South Africa’s Dr Precious Matsoso, co-chair of the INB, said in the statement.

“This is the first ever process to develop a proposed agreement on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response. Getting this done means getting it right, and the INB Bureau is committed to help finalise a meaningful, lasting agreement.”

Negotiating a complex treaty covering the complex issues of global disease outbreaks, with 194 countries required to agree to its terms, will be a long process that has already taken years.

But the pandemic agreement has not been abandoned.

* Some claims posted on Facebook and Instagram may have been deleted by users after being rated via Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program.

The post No, WHO agreement to better prepare for future pandemics hasn’t been ‘abandoned’ after ‘backlash’ appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 17 APRIL 2024
Published by Africa Check on 19 April 2024

The wealthy Asian country of Japan has banned mRNA Covid vaccines after they were linked to “sudden soaring deaths”.

That’s the claim circulating on social media in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa and elsewhere since late March 2024.*

It reads:

Japan has just banned Covid mRNA shots […] and called on other nations to follow suit after an official government study tied the injections to the nation’s soaring sudden deaths. Like many other countries around the world, Japan has been battling a crisis of skyrocketing sudden and unexpected deaths since 2021 […] the country is now facing population collapse […]

The claim has mainly been spread by an identical article published here, here, here and here. It’s attracted comments such as:

• Thank God that I wasn’t that stupid and none of my family members were that stupid to take that COVID shots….
• WAKE UP PEOPLE THE TRUTH IS ALL AROUND YOU ALREADY!!

The claim can also be seen here, here, here, here, here and here.

But it’s completely made up.

More than four years after Covid upended the world in 2020, dodgy websites are still trying to get clicks – and ad money – from false claims about the pandemic and the vaccines that helped bring it to a close.

Emergency vaccination legislation comes to an end

Japan has not banned mRNA vaccines. Instead, “temporary vaccinations” introduced in an amendment to the country’s Immunisation Act in 2021 expired at the end of March 2024.

The amendment made “immunisations with an urgent need for prevention” during the Covid pandemic available for free. People can still get an mRNA jab in Japan. The only difference is that most of them now have to pay for it.

From 1 April people aged 65 and older are to get the Covid jab, at a subsidised price, as a routine inoculation during the country’s autumn and winter. People under 65 who choose voluntary vaccination have to pay in full.

And far from banning mRNA Covid vaccines, in January Japanese regulators launched a new-generation mRNA vaccine that is the first of its kind to get official approval.

As Japan hasn’t banned mRNA jabs, it couldn’t have “called on other nations to follow suit”.

More than this, there is no credible evidence of any “official government study” that links Covid vaccines to the country’s “soaring sudden deaths”. Such a study would have made global headlines.

The country does have a relatively high death rate, but it’s not caused by Covid jabs.

An ageing population

Japan’s population crisis has been in the news recently, especially after the country reported that there had been a record high of 1.56 million deaths in 2022.

But this is due to an ageing population caused by a low birth rate. In 2023 government figures revealed that people aged 65 and older made up nearly 30% of Japan’s population, and people 80 and older made up 10%. In the same year, the country had its lowest number of births since records began in 1899.

The population decline has alarmed Japan’s government, which pumps some US$25 billion a year into subsidies for families with children in an effort to boost the birth rate.

But it’s still a decline, not a population “collapse”. The country’s population growth was at its lowest in 2022 – a negative 0.46% – but over the long term, the number of people in Japan has increased from 93.22 million in 1960 to 125.12 million in 2022.

And there are indications that the high number of excess deaths in 2022 were due to Covid itself – not the jabs that protected people from the disease.

Using an ad-blocking browser extension, Africa Check looked at the number of ads on web pages publishing the false claim. Six ads were blocked here, two here and here, and a whopping 14 here.

* Some claims posted on Facebook and Instagram may have been deleted by users after being rated via Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program.

The post No, Japan hasn’t banned mRNA Covid jabs, and population decline due to low birth rate appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 12 MARCH 2024

The US Navy executed Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, a top World Health Organization (WHO) official and former head of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), at Guantanamo Bay on 3 February 2024.

This absurdly false claim has been circulating online in South Africa and elsewhere since 10 February.*

Ihekweazu, an epidemiologist, heads the health emergency intelligence and surveillance systems division at the WHO headquarters in Geneva.

During his time at the NCDC he led Nigeria’s response to the Covid pandemic. His book about the experience, An Imperfect Storm, is due to be published later in 2024.

The claim that he was executed at Guantanamo Bay comes from a story headlined “JAG hangs WHO despot”, published on the disinformation website Real Raw News on 10 February.

It can also be seen here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

Guantanamo Bay, known as Gitmo, is a US Navy base and detention centre on the coast of Cuba in the Caribbean. JAG or the Judge Advocate General’s Corps is the legal arm of the US Navy.

The story says “Gitmo sources” told Real Raw News that JAG hanged Ihekweazu on 3 February after he had “surreptitiously entered the United States to discuss enacting fresh shelter-in-place and vaccine mandates with the CDC’s nefarious Rapid Response Team”.

The US Centers for Disease Control’s Global Rapid Response Team tackles public health emergencies such as cholera, Covid, dengue, Ebola, famine and natural disasters across the world.

The Real Raw News story reads like bad fiction. Here’s one bit:

Atop the platform, the hangman slipped the noose around Ihekweazu’s neck and checked the tautness. Satisfied, he stepped backward, his hand hovering an inch from the button that, when pushed, would end Ihekweazu’s life.

But none of this happened.

Ihekweazu joins other public figures not hanged at Gitmo

Guantanamo Bay has a decades-long reputation for illegal detention, torture and other human rights abuses.

If the US Navy had executed a top WHO official there it would have made headlines across the world. It hasn’t.

And Ihekweazu has been publicly active long after his supposed death on 3 February. He has, for example, posted dozens of times on his official X/Twitter account @Chikwe_I, including photos of himself at public events – here, here and here.

On 13 February he delivered the opening remarks at the launch of the first global peer review of the WHO’s Universal Health and Preparedness Review.

And in early March he wrote an obituary for Nigeria’s former Access Bank CEO Herbert Wigwe, who died in a helicopter crash in the US on 9 February. It was published by This Day and Nigeria Health Watch.

The claim is false.

It’s not the first time Real Raw News has made up a story about a public figure being hanged at Guantanamo Bay.

Other headlines on the site include “Eric Holder Hanged at GITMO”, “Dick Cheney Hanged at GITMO”, “Dr. Francis Collins Hanged at GITMO”, “John Brennan Hanged at GITMO” and “Bill Gates Hanged at GITMO Ahead of Schedule”.

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

Published by Africa Check on 14 March 2024

The post No, WHO epidemic expert and former Nigeria CDC head Ihekweazu not hanged at Guantanamo Bay appeared first on South Africa Gateway.

MARY ALEXANDER • 12 FEBRUARY 2024

“WEF Admits Disease X Will Be Unleashed In 2025,” reads the alarming headline of identical articles circulating on social media in Kenya, South Africa, Uganda and elsewhere since late January 2024.*

WEF is the World Economic Forum, an organisation that encourages governments and the private sector to cooperate on important global issues. It is often the target of false conspiracy theories.

The article was published on 23 January by The People’s Voice. The website, previously known as News Punch, is widely known to spread huge amounts of false information.

The piece has since been republished on several other websites and blogs. Its blurb reads: “The World Economic Forum (WEF) has declared that ‘Disease X’ will be unleashed onto the public by the year 2025 – and the consequences will be devastating for humanity.”

The claim also appears here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

It echoes the thoroughly debunked Plandemic conspiracy theory that the global Covid outbreak was somehow secretly planned by global elites that included drug companies, Bill Gates and the World Health Organization (WHO).

But Disease X doesn’t exist. And WEF didn’t “admit” that it would be “unleashed” in 2025.

Placeholder name for hypothetical disease

Disease X is simply a placeholder name for a possible unknown disease that may break out unexpectedly. It’s used in discussions about whether the world is prepared for another global pandemic and ways to reduce the harm of such an outbreak.

The name was first coined in the WHO’s 2018 review of diseases in urgent need of research and development, known as the R&D Blueprint.

The blueprint aims to reduce the time between when a serious disease is declared a public health emergency and when diagnostic tests, vaccines and other treatments become available. It came out of the 2014 Ebola outbreak that killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa and spread to a few cases in the US and Europe.

The 2018 R&D Blueprint lists eight diseases in “urgent need” of “accelerated research and development”. Seven are existing diseases, such as Ebola, Zika and Sars. The eighth is the unknown Disease X, which simply represents the “awareness that a serious international epidemic could be caused by a pathogen currently not recognized to cause human disease”.

Disease X not only doesn’t exist – it never will. Once a previously unknown disease becomes known, it will be given its own name.

‘Preparing for Disease X’ session at WEF annual meeting

On 17 January 2024, the WEF’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland held a session titled “Preparing for Disease X”. Participants included WHO director-general Tedros Ghebreyesus.

Its description reads: “With the World Health Organization continuing to research the potential of so-called ‘Disease X’, what novel efforts are needed to prepare healthcare systems for the multiple challenges ahead?”

At no point in the session did any of the speakers “admit” that Disease X would be “unleashed” in 2024.

The claim is false.

* Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.

Published by Africa Check on 14 February 2024

The post No, Disease X doesn’t exist – and World Economic Forum didn’t say it would be ‘unleashed’ in 2025 appeared first on South Africa Gateway.