Authors
A self-taught social media maverick, Saurabh realised the power of social media early on and began following and analysing false narratives and ‘fake news’ even before he entered the field of fact-checking professionally. He is fascinated with the visual medium, technology and politics, and at Newschecker, where he leads social media strategy, he is a jack of all trades. With a burning desire to uncover the truth behind events that capture people's minds and make sense of the facts in the noisy world of social media, he fact checks misinformation in Hindi and English at Newschecker.
Claim
As per a report published by CNN, “The US has got the vaccine for Novel Coronavirus…
They are in testing mode on humans and in the next 3 weeks, everything will be fine…28,000 patients got cured of coronavirus…”
Verification
We were tagged to fact check a viral message which attributes to CNN and claims that the vaccine for Novel coronavirus has been invented in the US and it is currently being tested on humans. The message also claims that within 3 weeks, the vaccine will bring normalcy from the epidemic. As per the claim, 28,000 people have been cured of the novel coronavirus. Misinformation, Fake News and Disinformation related to Novel Coronavirus are seeing a huge surge, fact-checkers across the globe have been trying their best to curb the counterfeiting of facts related to coronavirus ever since the virus emerged in the first place. Fact-checkers across the world in multiple languages have allied under the International Fact-Checking Network to debunk the hoaxes related to the virus and to surface the truth. Detailed information on misinformation, disinformation and fake news busted by IFCN signatories can be viewed here.
As we began to fact check this claim, we first searched Google for more information on this claim. We used the same keywords that of the claim and we found a report published by CNN. The headline of the report reads, “The US has started human testing of a drug to treat the novel coronavirus”
The US has started human testing of a drug to treat the novel coronavirus
News of the drug testing came just as a federal health official warned that the virus will eventually start spreading in US communities.
After reading the CNN report, we found that the US has indeed invented a vaccine and has started the human testing of the vaccine which is being claimed as a treatment of the novel coronavirus. The CNN reports also informs that the first subject of the human testing of the drug invented by the US is an American who was evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan.
We found that the first part of the viral message is true. Now we tried to find the reality of the other claims in the viral message. The other claim reads, “Within 3 weeks, everything will be fine.” As per the CNN report, there is no such deadline as to when the vaccine will start working. The CNN report states “Participants in the US treatment group will receive 200 milligrams of remdesivir intravenously when they’re enrolled in the study. They will receive another 100 milligrams while they are hospitalized for up to 10 days total. A placebo group will receive a solution that resembles remdesivir but contains only inactive ingredients, the NIH said.”
We also searched other media reports and the official Twitter handles of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) and Centers for Disease Control & Prevention for more information on the viral message.
First, we checked the official Twitter handle of HHS but apart from the awareness around the novel coronavirus, we didn’t get much information. We then checked the Twitter handle of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and we found a tweet in which the CDC has provided updated guidance on evaluating and testing persons under investigation for novel coronavirus.
The latest CDC Health Alert Network (HAN) Update provides updated guidance on evaluating and testing persons under investigation (#PUIs) for #COVID19. See https://t.co/PvgSSbNt98 pic.twitter.com/Rk2HAl79zF
— CDC (@CDCgov) February 29, 2020
In the aforementioned tweet, the CDC has given the link of a report which is being updated by the CDC as soon as there is a major update.
HAN Archive – 00428 | Health Alert Network (HAN)
Distributed via the CDC Health Alert Network February 28, 2020, 15:05 ET (3:05 PM ET) CDCHAN-00428 Summary The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) continues to closely monitor and respond to the COVID-19 outbreak caused by the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2.
We then searched media reports for more information on the issue. A few items from our findings are listed below.
US health officials say human trials on coronavirus vaccine to start in 6 weeks
Human trials testing a potential vaccine for the COVID-19 coronavirus are expected to begin in six weeks, U.S. health officials announced Tuesday. “We are on time at least and maybe even a little bit better,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, told reporters at a press conference.
U.S. Plans ‘Radical Expansion’ of Coronavirus Testing
The C.D.C. announced that it would allow hundreds of labs to test for the virus, while the Trump administration said it was distributing tens of thousands of testing kits. After weeks of stalled testing for the coronavirus, the United States now has enough diagnostic kits to test 75,000 people, with more on the way, Alex M.
This is what has to happen for a coronavirus vaccine to be affordable
By If a vaccine for coronavirus is developed there is no guarantee that every American will be able to afford it, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told lawmakers earlier this week. However, other health experts say that won’t be the case if the government pays for the development of a vaccine.
Now we began fact-checking the third and the last part of the message which claims that 28,000 patients got cured of coronavirus because of the vaccine that is being tested. The viral message attributes its content to the CNN reports, we searched multiple reports published by CNN but we didn’t find any such report. We found a report published by CNN on February 6, 2020, which informs that the total number of infected people from coronavirus has increased to 28,000.
February 6 coronavirus news – CNN
Our live coverage of the coronavirus outbreak has An evacuee from Wuhan, China who arrived at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in Southern California was transported to a local hospital after developing a fever or a cough, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a statement Thursday.
We also found a similar report published by the New York Times on the same date as of the CNN report.
China Begins Testing an Antiviral Drug in Coronavirus Patients
Patients in a clinical trial will receive a placebo or remdesivir, which has shown promise in laboratory studies. China is forging ahead in the search for treatments for people sickened by the new coronavirus that has infected more than 28,000 people in a countrywide epidemic, killed more than 500 and seeded smaller outbreaks in 24 other nations.
Since we know from the sources mentioned above that the vaccine/drug is being tested currently and hence it has not been shared with any other country, we searched for the total number of coronavirus cases in the US. We found a report published by the New York Times on March 2, 2020, which updates the number of cases as 88.
Coronavirus Updates: United States Records First 2 Deaths
March 2, 2020, 12:41 a.m. ET Cases in the United States skyrocketed by 35 percent over the weekend. States from coast to coast reported new cases, including the first two deaths at the same hospital in Washington State. Right Now Stocks rose in Asia on Monday as investors bet that the world’s governments and central banks would step in to help.
As per the New York Times report, the total number of coronavirus cases in the US jumped 35 percent, to 88 on March 2, 2020.
We also searched for the number of total patients who are cured of coronavirus but we didn’t find a collated report on how many patients have been cured of the virus. There are some individual reports though, for instance, Economic Times on February 28, 2020 reports that 36,117 patients have been discharged in China.
Coronavirus reappears in discharged patients, raising questions in containment fight
Experts say there are several ways discharged patients could fall ill with the virus again. Convalescing patients might not build up enough antibodies to develop immunity to SARS-CoV-2, and are being infected again. The virus also could be “biphasic”, meaning it lies dormant before creating new symptoms.
Hence it is evident from our article that the viral message is misleading as concerned authorities have not given any specific deadline of three weeks for the vaccine(drug) which is being tested currently. We also found that the claim of 28,000 people being cured of the coronavirus because of the vaccine invented by the US is ‘False’ as there are only 88 coronavirus cases in the US and the vaccine has not yet been shared with any other country.
Tools Used
Google Search
Twitter Advanced Search
Result: Misleading
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Authors
A self-taught social media maverick, Saurabh realised the power of social media early on and began following and analysing false narratives and ‘fake news’ even before he entered the field of fact-checking professionally. He is fascinated with the visual medium, technology and politics, and at Newschecker, where he leads social media strategy, he is a jack of all trades. With a burning desire to uncover the truth behind events that capture people's minds and make sense of the facts in the noisy world of social media, he fact checks misinformation in Hindi and English at Newschecker.
