MEBRO · DISINFO DESK
Investigations
Long-form dossiers on the hoaxes, deepfakes, and death rumors that go viral — each one stamped with a verdict and printed with every source on the record.
Science & Health
USDA 'Transgender Study': How Research on Hygiene Products Got Misrepresented
Headlines claimed the USDA canceled a wasteful "transgender study" — but the $600,000 grant actually funded feminine-hygiene product safety research, and "transgender men" appeared in just one sentence of the proposal.
FILED OCT 15, 2026 · UPDATED OCT 15, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
The "72 vs. 11" Vaccine Claim: A Misleading Comparison — and a Schedule That Then Changed
A January 2026 White House graphic claimed U.S. children get 72 vaccine injections versus 11 in Denmark. Fact-checkers found the two counts used different methods — and weeks later, the CDC itself cut the U.S. schedule to just 11 diseases.
FILED OCT 14, 2026 · UPDATED OCT 14, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
Tylenol and Autism: FDA Warning Claims Fact-Checked
Fact-check of claims that Tylenol (acetaminophen) during pregnancy causes autism, following the Trump administration's September 2025 announcement. The most rigorous study to date — a 2024 JAMA sibling-control analysis of 2.4 million children — found no causal link, and ACOG, the Autism Science Foundation, and Tylenol's own maker say the claim outpaces the evidence.
FILED OCT 12, 2026 · UPDATED OCT 12, 2026 · 6 SOURCES
Science & Health
The Lipid War: RFK Jr.'s 'Inverted Food Pyramid' and the Seed Oil Conspiracy
On January 7, 2026, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. unveiled a federal 'Inverted Food Pyramid' prioritizing red meat and full-fat dairy over grains — a real policy shift now tangled up with the viral, scientifically unsupported 'Hateful Eight' seed-oil conspiracy theory.
FILED SEP 29, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 29, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
mRNA Vaccine Misinformation 2025: Kennedy's $500M Defunding Based on False Claims
Comprehensive fact-check of RFK Jr.'s claims that mRNA vaccines 'fail to protect effectively.' Experts call it an 'exercise in disinformation.' HHS-cited bibliography was compiled by a dentist, not scientists.
FILED SEP 19, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 19, 2026 · 13 SOURCES
Science & Health
RFK Jr. and FDA's Makary Overstated Hormone Therapy's Disease-Prevention Benefits
After the FDA lifted decades-old black-box warnings on menopausal hormone therapy in November 2025, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and FDA Commissioner Marty Makary claimed the treatment cuts heart-disease risk by up to 50% and Alzheimer's risk by 35% — specific figures that researchers and fact-checkers say come from outdated or misapplied studies.
FILED SEP 14, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 14, 2026 · 6 SOURCES
Science & Health
Measles Surge 2026: How Anti-Vax Misinformation Fuels a Preventable Crisis
1,136 measles cases in 58 days. 94–96% unvaccinated. South Carolina's worst outbreak since elimination. How RFK Jr., social media misinformation, and vaccine schedule manipulation turned a preventable disease into a national emergency.
FILED SEP 14, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 14, 2026 · 30 SOURCES
Science & Health
2026 Measles Outbreak and Anti-Vaccine Misinformation Surge
910 confirmed US cases in the first six weeks of 2026, on top of 2025's highest annual total in three decades. Kindergarten MMR coverage has slipped to 92.5%, below the 95% threshold, while RFK Jr. fired all 17 CDC vaccine advisers. Roughly 95% of cases are unvaccinated or of unknown status. The MMR-autism claim fueling the surge remains a proven fraud.
FILED SEP 13, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 13, 2026 · 31 SOURCES
Science & Health
Measles 'Natural' Cures Claims: Dangerous Misinformation Exposed
Fact-check of measles misinformation during the 2025 West Texas outbreak: RFK Jr.'s vitamin A and 'quarantine' claims, 505 cases and two child deaths as of April 8, and why 'natural' remedies cannot replace vaccination.
FILED SEP 13, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 13, 2026 · 7 SOURCES
Science & Health
No, RFK Jr. Didn't Say Hospice Patients 'Aren't Dying Fast Enough.' He Was Describing Fraud.
Viral clips from HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Fox News town hall stripped his comments about fraudulent, patient-less hospices in California and reframed them as an attack on dying patients. The underlying fraud crackdown is real; the viral gloss on his words isn't.
FILED SEP 5, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 5, 2026 · 3 SOURCES
Science & Health
Byron Donalds Blames Measles Outbreaks on Immigration. The CDC's Own Numbers Say Otherwise.
Florida's Republican nominee for governor told CBS News that "rampant illegal immigration" caused the country's worst measles outbreak since 1991. Public health data trace the outbreaks to falling vaccination rates instead.
FILED SEP 4, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 4, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
TikTok Says Black Seed Oil Beats Ibuprofen. The Studies Don't Say That.
Chiropractor Eric Berg's videos calling black seed oil "the #1 most anti-inflammatory food in the world" have fed an 18.7-million-view TikTok trend. The human trials behind the claim are small, combined with real medication, and don't test it against ibuprofen at all.
FILED SEP 1, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 1, 2026 · 3 SOURCES
Science & Health
RFK Jr. Says the MMR Vaccine Contains Fetal Tissue. It Doesn't.
As Pennsylvania's measles outbreak killed two children, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told the state's governor the MMR vaccine contains "646 billion pieces" of aborted fetal DNA. Vaccine scientists say the purification process removes every trace of the cells used to grow it.
FILED SEP 1, 2026 · UPDATED SEP 1, 2026 · 3 SOURCES
Science & Health
FDA Commissioner's 3,500x Overstatement: The Autism Drug That Helps 70 Children, Not Hundreds of Thousands
FDA Commissioner Marty Makary claimed leucovorin would help 'hundreds of thousands' of autistic children. The FDA approved it for ~70 with a rare genetic condition. Prescriptions surged 71%, and reporting documented real supply strain on a drug also used in cancer care.
FILED AUG 30, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 30, 2026 · 27 SOURCES
Science & Health
Ebola Vaccine Sterility Claims: The Conspiracy That Endangers Public Health
Claims that Ebola vaccines cause infertility are dangerous misinformation with no basis in the regulatory or scientific record. FDA, EMA, and peer-reviewed research show no evidence of a fertility risk.
FILED AUG 27, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 27, 2026 · 14 SOURCES
Science & Health
Ebola Outbreak 2025 (DRC): Misinformation Analysis
Fact-check of misinformation around the 2025 Bulape Health Zone Ebola outbreak in DRC's Kasai Province: false cures, transmission myths, and distrust of health workers checked against WHO, CDC, and peer-reviewed evidence.
FILED AUG 27, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 27, 2026 · 17 SOURCES
Science & Health
Ebola Organ Theft Claims: Deadly Misinformation Debunked
Conspiracy theories claiming Ebola treatment centers harvested organs fueled deadly attacks on health workers in West Africa and the DRC. No organ-theft evidence has ever been documented, despite years of on-the-ground scrutiny by WHO, CDC, MSF, and independent journalists.
FILED AUG 26, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 26, 2026 · 12 SOURCES
Science & Health
RFK Jr. Says Obesity Is Dropping Because of Trump. The Decline Started Under Biden — and GLP-1 Drugs Get the Credit.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has told at least three audiences since June that obesity rates are falling because of the current administration's food policy. The decline is real — but it began in 2022, and researchers say it tracks the explosion of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs, not diet change.
FILED AUG 26, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 26, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
RFK Jr. Said the US Had the World's Highest COVID Death Rate. It Wasn't Even Close.
On CNN, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claimed America suffered the highest COVID-19 death rate on Earth. Per capita, at least a dozen countries — starting with Peru — had it worse.
FILED AUG 24, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 24, 2026 · 3 SOURCES
Science & Health
Trump's Vaccine Order Cites an Autism Link. Decades of Research Say There Isn't One.
On August 10, President Trump signed an executive order cutting the childhood vaccine schedule and citing rising autism rates as the reason — a link that dozens of large studies covering millions of children have failed to find.
FILED AUG 18, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 18, 2026 · 3 SOURCES
Science & Health
AI Models Spread Medical Misinformation: Mount Sinai Study Reveals 32-47% Error Rates
Peer-reviewed Lancet study reveals leading medical AI models accept false health claims 32-47% of the time. 40M daily users, documented harm cases in patient-safety testing, but simple safety prompts cut errors nearly in half. Full analysis of Mount Sinai's 3.4M prompt test across 20 LLMs.
FILED AUG 15, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 15, 2026 · 20 SOURCES
Science & Health
Can Your AI Doctor Lie? The Alarming Study That Says Yes
A Lancet Digital Health study tested 20 AI models with over 1 million prompts and found they believed false medical claims 32% of the time. Medical fine-tuned models performed worse than general ones. ECRI named AI chatbot misuse the #1 health tech hazard for 2026.
FILED AUG 15, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 15, 2026 · 16 SOURCES
Science & Health
The Fake 82% Miscarriage Rate Four Senators Pinned on Fauci
Ted Cruz, Ron Johnson, Rand Paul, and Lisa McClain say newly released texts prove Fauci hid a vaccine miscarriage bombshell. The number comes from throwing out 700 of the study's participants.
FILED AUG 15, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 15, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
Science & Health
AI Chatbots Believe Medical Misinformation: When Your Doctor Is an Algorithm
A landmark Lancet Digital Health study found AI chatbots accept fabricated medical claims roughly 32% of the time. With 230 million weekly health users and a regulator actively loosening oversight, the stakes could not be higher.
FILED AUG 14, 2026 · UPDATED AUG 14, 2026 · 30 SOURCES
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Investigative reports — not user-submitted fact-checks.