Misleading: The content of a Twitter post that features the cover of a newspaper, from April of this year, whose headline states that Pfizer knew that its vaccines would kill people is misleading. The data used in the newspaper article were taken out of context and still had a misinterpretation.
Investigated Content: post shows a photo of the headline “Pfizer knew their vaccine would kill”, from an English print publication, and the following sentences: “Pfizer knew his vaccine could kill” and “But wasn’t it all our conspiracy theory?”.
where it was published: Twitter
Completion of Proof: A post that echoes a photo of an English print newspaper – pointed out as a propagator of conspiracy theories – with the following headline: “Pfizer knew their vaccine would kill” is misleading. The text of the independent publication is based on documents released by the FDA, the regulatory agency of the United States, at the request of a group of doctors.
However, text and headline distort the reality of the facts. As the Pfizer document itself explains, the number of deaths highlighted in the text is not directly related to the application of the vaccine, as the headline suggests. These are spontaneous reports by individuals or medical teams of events occurring after vaccination, which are treated as suspected adverse events.
Receiving spontaneous reports is part of a vaccine safety and efficacy monitoring strategy. The European Union adopts the same procedure, through the platform EudraVigilance. At EMA vaccine safety pagethe claim is that vaccines are safe and effective, and that serious problems related to the application of doses are extremely rare.
For Comprova, misleading is content that uses inaccurate data or that leads to an interpretation different from the author’s intention; content that confuses, with or without the deliberate intent to cause harm.
Scope of publication: Comprova investigates the most far-reaching suspicious content on social networks. The verified post, as of May 2, 2022, has reached over a thousand likes and 460 reposts, which further increases its reach. The newspaper that published the article, on the other hand, has free and irregular distribution in several cities in the United Kingdom and the United States and its reach is not calculable.
What the author of the publication says: Paulo Filippus is a businessman, has a company that provides technical support for electronic equipment in Santa Catarina, in addition to trading cryptocurrencies. He was a member of the Free Brazil Movement (MBL) and candidate for councilor in the city of Gaspar, Santa Catarina, in 2016 by DEM. He was not elected.
Sought after by his social networks and by the means of contact of the websites of his companies, Paulo did not manifest himself until the moment of publication.
How do we check: Comprova consulted editions of The Light Paper on the internet and reports about the publication and its founder in news outlets, especially in local English cities. The team also consulted information about the company responsible for the newspaper on the UK government website, and reached out to Pfizer to clarify the headline data verified here. Pfizer did not respond to the report’s contact.
Comprova made this verification based on scientific information and official data on the new coronavirus and covid-19 available on May 2, 2022.
April’s headline
The story that generated the headline claiming that Pfizer knew its vaccine would cause deaths is based on a document provided by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the US regulatory agency, about the vaccine approval process. He is part of a data set published after a group of doctors go to court demanding transparency.
THE document is an analysis of data spontaneously provided by patients or medical teams about conditions, clinical or otherwise, observed in the period following the application of a dose of Pfizer’s vaccine against covid-19.
There were 42,086 cases reported between December 1, 2020 and February 28, 2021, ranging from headache, shortness of breath, heart problems to even lack of appetite or depression. The purpose of the data collected was to monitor the effectiveness of the vaccine and its safety. Of the 1,223 deaths mentioned in the text, 454 cases refer to patients who were immunized, but were infected with covid-19, developed severe symptoms of the disease and later died. The cause of death was a problem due to the disease and not the vaccine.
According to observations made by Pfizer itself in this report presented to the European agency, the data should not be used as an analysis of risk or even effectiveness, but as a possible alert in certain circumstances. This is because the text presented in the article is just one of a hundred others that were sent to regulatory agencies as a way of monitoring the effects of the vaccine. It is not possible to make a definitive analysis of the drug by observing only a part of the data produced.
A similar explanation, with the exception of the direct relationship between the spontaneously reported adverse effect and the vaccine, appears in the security page of the EMA vaccines. The updated numbers show the total of applied immunizers and suspected adverse effects spontaneously reported by the population from the platform EudraVigilance.
The newspaper and its founder
The Light Paper newspaper was registered as a company in the UK on 9 September 2020, as stated on the website of the Companies Housean agency linked to the UK Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, responsible for the registration and dissolution of companies.
The newspaper is published monthly on the internet and also circulates in print. The first edition is from September 2020. According to document from September 16, 2021, the headquarters are in the city of Manchester, England. The company, however, was compulsorily dissolved by Companies House on February 15, 2022.
Comprova sent an email to the Press office Companies House to understand the reasons for the dissolution of the company, but received no response. One reportage of the Stroud News & Journal website, however, mentions failure to register the company’s accounts and pay taxes as reasons for the compulsory dissolution of a company by Companies House.
Although the company has ceased to exist legally, as reported by Stroud News & Journal, The Light continues to be published. The last issue, from April this year, is the one that appears in the verified tweet.
The newspaper’s founder and editor is 51-year-old Darren Smith. He also identifies himself as Darren Nesbitt, as stated in reportage from The Guardian. The name is what appears on the Companies House company listing as the person who owns the control of the company.
In addition to the newspaper, Smith has a guitar shop in the city of Manchester, England, where he lives, and a manufacture of t-shirts with phrases from famous conspiracy theories such as the denial of the presence of man on the moon and questions about the veracity of the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States.
Contents
The publication calls itself “the truthpaper” or “The Uncensored Truth”. Content against lockdowns, the use of masks and vaccination against covid-19 is published, in headlines such as “End face masks and social distancing, Top Scientists Say” (End of mask use and social distancing, say scientists), “ Covid shots kill and injure hundreds” and “Masks do more harm than good”. Another questions the very existence of the pandemic: “What pandemic?” (What pandemic?).
The newspaper often claims that the covid-19 pandemic is a hoax and echoes conspiracy theories that speak of mind control through vaccination and the installation of a global dictatorial regime that would be behind the implementation of the pandemic. schedule 21the set of standards for sustainable development launched at a United Nations (UN) conference in Rio de Janeiro in 1992.
In the November 2021 edition, the newspaper published an article in defense of singer and broadcaster Graham Hart, convicted and imprisoned in England, in august 2021, accused of propagating song and ideas that question the Holocaust. The text generated protest against The Light in Stroud City.
Circulation
The Light Paper survives from donations, advertisements and the sale, to supporters, of lots of copies, which are distributed in anti-lockdown protests, gas stations, coffee shops and other public areas of English cities. Edits are also placed in mailboxes and under the door of residents’ homes.
In an internet consultation, it is possible to check local news that alerts about the newspaper’s distribution. In this reportage of Cambridgeshire Live, a Cambridge reader reports that his grandmother received the newspaper in her mailbox, and that she suspects the distribution is aimed at the elderly. The article claims that there are reports of the newspaper being distributed in London, Manchester, Yorkshire, North Wales, Surrey and Leicestershire.
In this reportage from Bracknell News, the complaint comes from a woman who claims to have received under her door, in the city of Bracknell, an edition of the newspaper with claims that the covid-19 pandemic was a hoax.
The Doncaster Free Press complaint distribution of the newspaper in the city of Doncaster and claims that the publication has been considered “dangerous” for spreading “false and misleading information about vaccines and conspiracy theories involving covid-19”.
In this reportageThe Guardian draws attention to the newspaper’s strategy of circumventing online news checkers and social media platforms by distributing a printed version with a layout that resembles that of vehicles of recognized credibility.
why do we investigate: Comprova investigates suspicious content that goes viral on the internet and is related to this year’s presidential elections, the realization of public works and the covid-19 pandemic. In this case, the verified post contributes to discredit the population about the effectiveness and safety of vaccines against covid-19, which have been approved by surveillance agencies around the world.
Other checks on the topic: Comprova has already investigated a series of other content that had the same intention of questioning the safety of vaccines. The teams showed that mRNA vaccines are not gene therapy and do not cause covid and that one deputy omitted data to attack vaccines. It was also evident that Regulatory agencies rule out risk of infertility for vaccinees is that claims that the Covid-19 vaccine causes cancer, genetic damage and even “homosexuality” are false.“.
Investigated by CNN Brasil and O Dia. Verified by A Gazeta, imirante.com, CBN Cuiabá, Correio Braziliense, Estadão, SBT, SBT News and Plural Curitiba.
Source: CNN Brasil
