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** 'Turbo Cancer' Disinformation
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There has been a lot of misinformation and disinformation about COVID-19, but among the cruelest is the groundless claim that COVID-19 vaccines cause "turbo cancer."

As Staff Writer Kate Yandell writes, COVID-19 has killed more than 1.1 million people in the United States, and people with cancer are particularly vulnerable to severe disease and death from COVID-19. Vaccines provide much needed protection.

Yet, as Kate writes, there are people spreading claims on social media about "turbo cancer" -- a made-up term used by people who claim that the COVID-19 vaccines are dangerous and can cause particularly fast-growing cancer.

But there isn’t evidence that this phenomenon is real.

In her article, Kate writes about recent social media posts that say: "SHOCKING: New Study proves Pfizer mRNA induced turbo cancer." The study, published May 1 in Frontiers in Oncology, describes one mouse that died from lymphoma out of 14 mice that were given a high dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine delivered into their veins, which is not how the COVID-19 vaccines are given to people.

The study, which was not meant to evaluate cancer in mice, does not show the mouse’s blood cancer was related to the vaccine.

A co-author of the paper -- Sander Eens, a cardiovascular disease researcher at the University of Antwerp -- told Kate: “Our case report in no way attempts to demonstrate a causal relationship between the identified lymphoma and the mRNA vaccine.” To date, he added, he and his colleagues have given the vaccine to 70 mice and have seen no further cases of any type of cancer.

More important, vaccine safety monitoring systems and most studies on humans have not found an association between the vaccines and cancer.

“Lastly, we would like to stress that COVID-19 vaccines have demonstrated exceptional safety and efficacy in the fight against the pandemic, and manifestations of serious adverse events after COVID-19 vaccination are very rare,” Eens told Kate. “To date, there is no scientific evidence of a causal link between mRNA vaccines and cancer development.”

For more, read "COVID-19 Vaccines Have Not Been Shown to Cause ‘Turbo Cancer ([link removed]) .'"
HOW WE KNOW
We rely on the Energy Information Administration when writing about energy-related claims. When former President Donald Trump said "windmills ... don't work," we turned to the EIA. In 2022, 10.2% of U.S. utility-scale electricity generation came from wind -- which works particularly well in middle America, where wind speeds are highest. Texas is the top wind energy producer in the U.S., followed by Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas and Illinois. Trump won four of the five states in 2020, losing only Illinois. Read more ([link removed]) .
FEATURED FACT
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that higher-risk people and their contacts to mask up when a person’s county-level hospital admission level is “medium.” When it’s “high,” everyone is advised to wear a high-quality mask or respirator, such as an N95, and higher-risk people are advised to avoid “non-essential indoor activities in public.” As of the week ending Aug. 19, seven counties are listed as “high,” and 117 are “medium,” according to ([link removed]) the CDC's COVID Data Tracker. Read more ([link removed]) .
WORTHY OF NOTE
Hearst Television, which has been one of our partners ([link removed]) since 2019, worked with us to produce a fact-checking segment of the first Republican debate.

Christopher Salas ([link removed]) , a Washington, D.C. correspondent for Hearst TV, did the segment, which covered issues including abortion, climate change, illegal immigration and the war in Ukraine.

The fact-checking segment can be viewed here ([link removed]) . For more, read our story "Fact-Checking the First GOP Debate ([link removed]) ."
REPLY ALL

Reader: Did [special counsel Jack] Smith's aide meet with WH staff prior to [the] Trump charges, as stated in the New York Post?

FactCheck.org Director Eugene Kiely: White House visitor logs ([link removed]) show Jay Bratt visited Caroline Saba in the West Wing of the White House on March 31.

Saba was a special assistant to the White House deputy counsels – a relatively low-level White House position with a salary of $49,056, according to ([link removed]) the 2022 White House report on its staffers. She is not listed in the most recent 2023 report and no longer works at the White House.

Jay Bratt is chief of the counterintelligence and export control section in the Department of Justice’s National Security Division. As we have written in “Timeline of FBI Investigation of Trump’s Handling of Highly Classified Documents ([link removed]) ,” Bratt was one of four government officials who met with an attorney for former President Trump at Mar-a-Lago on June 3, 2022, to retrieve classified documents that the Trump legal team agreed to turn over in response to a subpoena.

Bratt’s visit raised concerns that the former president was not turning over all the classified documents that he had in his possession, despite a Trump lawyer's “signed certification letter” that said a “diligent search was conducted” for “all documents that are responsive to the subpoena,” a DOJ court filing ([link removed]) said. After further investigation, the government’s concern was confirmed -– resulting in the FBI obtaining a court-approved search warrant on Aug. 5, 2022.

The search warrant was executed on Aug. 8, 2022. As we wrote in our timeline, the search resulted in the recovery ([link removed]) of “roughly 13,000 documents totaling approximately 22,000 pages,” including "over one hundred unique documents with classification markings — that is, more than twice the amount produced on June 3, 2022, in response to the grand jury subpoena,” the DOJ said ([link removed]) . The classified materials were found not only in the Mar-a-Lago storage room, but also in Trump’s office.

The former president was indicted ([link removed]) in that case on June 9 of this year.

Why was Jay Bratt at the White House in March? The New York Post wrote ([link removed]) : “Peter Carr, a spokesman for the special counsel, said Bratt was at the White House for a ‘case-related interview’ but declined to comment further. … A person with knowledge of the 2023 visit insisted that it was ‘an interview of a career official who was also working at the White House during the Trump Administration.’” That would make sense, but we cannot say for sure why Bratt was at the White House.

Bratt is still actively involved in the case. He was listed as a lawyer to special counsel Jack Smith in an Aug. 22 court filing ([link removed]) . As we explain in our timeline, federal prosecutors disclosed in that filing that Mar-a-Lago’s director of information technology “retracted his prior false testimony and provided information that implicated” Trump and two Mar-a-Lago employees in “efforts to delete security camera footage” at the club after the government told Trump lawyers that it would be seeking a subpoena to obtain the surveillance camera footage. The filing said the government expects to call the IT director as a trial witness to testify about “efforts to delete security footage.”


** Wrapping Up
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Here's what else we've got for you this week:
* "No Support for Viral Claim That COVID-19 ‘Lockdowns’ Are Returning This Fall ([link removed]) ": The U.S. is seeing an uptick in COVID-19 cases, so it may be prudent for people to wear masks when out in public and take a few extra precautions. But the government is not planning to implement mask mandates or “lockdowns,” despite claims from the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.
* "DeSantis’ Military Service as Navy Lawyer for SEAL Commander ([link removed]) ": At the first Republican presidential primary debate, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis touted his military experience, saying he “was assigned with U.S. Navy SEALs in Iraq” and “deployed to Iraq alongside U.S. Navy SEALs.” That’s accurate: He was a Navy lawyer who advised a SEAL commander.
* "Conservative Posts Misrepresent Royalty Payments to Fauci and Collins ([link removed]) ": Documents show that Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Francis Collins received 58 royalty payments from 2010 to 2021 for their research. Only three of the payments came in 2020 or 2021; the rest were made prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. But social media posts falsely claimed all the payments were “for allowing companies to use their COVID-19 vaccines.”
* "Online Videos Share Fabricated Story About FEMA and Marines on Maui ([link removed]) ": The Federal Emergency Management Agency operates a Disaster Recovery Center on Maui and has approved $7 million in assistance to thousands of wildfire survivors. Online videos, however, are sharing a fabricated tale about FEMA’s operations, including a “shootout” with U.S. Marines. The bogus story originated on a satirical website.
* "Number of Counties Won in Presidential Election Doesn’t Determine Outcome ([link removed]) ": Democrats tend to win in densely populated counties, while Republicans win more sparse, rural counties. In 2020, the counties won by President Joe Biden had 67 million more residents than counties won by former President Donald Trump. Yet a social media post falsely asserts that because Biden won with fewer counties than Trump, “something isn’t adding up.”
* "Posts Share Altered Image from Fox News’ Coverage of Fatal Shooting at UNC-Chapel Hill ([link removed]) ": After a fatal shooting at the University of North Carolina, Fox News displayed a photo of the suspect with this caption: “UNC Police Release Picture of Person of Interest.” But an altered screenshot of the news report circulating online shows this caption under the photo: “Shooter Described as ‘Mostly White Asian Male.'” A Fox News spokesperson called that caption a “fake.”

Y lo que publicamos en español ([link removed]) (English versions are accessible in each story):
* "Una inyección protege a los bebés de la hospitalización por VRS, no se la ha relacionado con muertes ([link removed]) ": Cada año, el virus respiratorio sincitial (VRS) hospitaliza entre 58.000 y 80.000 niños menores de 5 años en EE. UU. La Administración de Alimentos y Medicamentos recientemente aprobó una inyección de anticuerpos para proteger a los bebés durante la temporada de VRS. No hay pruebas de que las inyecciones hayan matado a ningún bebé, contrariamente a lo que se afirma en las redes sociales.
* "Lo que VAERS puede y no puede hacer, y cómo frecuentemente grupos antivacunas utilizan sus datos de forma indebida ([link removed]) ": El Sistema de Notificación de Eventos Adversos de las Vacunas, o VAERS, por sus siglas en inglés, ha sido explotado por personas que se oponen a las vacunas por décadas. Aquí explicaremos cómo funciona el VAERS y repasaremos cinco conceptos erróneos que los activistas antivacunas emplean para engañar a la gente en torno a las vacunas.
* "Los fuertes vientos y la sequía provocaron los incendios de Maui, no hay pruebas de que fueran intencionados ([link removed]) ": No se sabe qué provocó los incendios forestales en Maui, aunque algunas pruebas apuntan a líneas eléctricas caídas. Las condiciones eran propicias para un incendio debido a que una gran cantidad de pastos invasores estaban secos por las sequías y fuertes vientos ayudaron a propagar rápidamente las llamas. Sin embargo, publicaciones falsas en las redes sociales afirman sin fundamento que los incendios fueron intencionalmente provocados.

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