FactCheck.org’s SciCheck feature focuses exclusively on false and misleading scientific claims that are made by partisans to influence public policy. It was launched in January 2015 with a grant from the Stanton Foundation. The foundation was founded by the late Frank Stanton, president of CBS for 25 years, from 1946 to 1971.
Q: Does vitamin D help protect against COVID-19?
A: Some scientists have hypothesized vitamin D might be helpful, but there is no direct evidence that vitamin D can prevent COVID-19 or lessen disease severity. Nevertheless, it should be part of a healthy lifestyle.
In revealing that he’s taking the drug to prevent COVID-19, the president distorted the facts.
At a White House meeting with fellow Republicans, President Donald Trump said, without evidence, that the coronavirus “is going to go away without a vaccine.” While it’s impossible to predict the future, experts say it’s unlikely that the virus will simply go away.
The Trump administration has repeatedly claimed that there are enough COVID-19 tests for states to begin reopening their economies. While that may be true for select locations, experts say more tests are needed, even if they don’t agree on a particular number.
Dismissing concerns that states are reopening too soon, President Donald Trump incorrectly said that a newly revised model projecting 134,000 COVID-19 deaths by August “assumes no mitigation.” In fact, the model assumes states will keep their existing social distancing measures in place, unless suspensions have already been announced.
In this video, we take a look at COVID-19 antibody tests, which can reveal whether someone was previously infected with the novel coronavirus — and explain why a positive or negative result may not always be so easy to interpret.
We’ll run through how the tests work and why it’s so hard to interpret what the results might mean.
In a weekend tweet, President Donald Trump erroneously described a New York Times article, falsely stating that it said the coronavirus originated in Europe and suggesting that it had no named sources.
Falsely citing “studies,” President Donald Trump has suggested that there are few novel coronavirus cases in “malaria countries” because of the use of the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine. But no such studies exist, and the drug is not widely used for malaria in much of the world.
In this video, we explore the existing research on face masks as tools to limit the spread of infectious diseases and explain why the CDC changed its stance on whether people who aren’t sick need to cover their faces.