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

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

MISLEADING

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

FALSE

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

MISLEADING

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

FALSE

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

MISLEADING

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

FALSE

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

MISLEADING

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

FALSE

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

MISLEADING

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

FALSE

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

FALSE

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

TRUE

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

TRUE

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

FALSE

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

TRUE

Science & Health

African Tetanus/Polio Sterilization Claims: Recycled Conspiracy Theories Debunked

Comprehensive fact-check of recycled conspiracy theories claiming WHO and UNICEF vaccines caused mass sterilization in Africa.

FILED JAN 2, 2026 · UPDATED JUL 11, 2026 · 15 SOURCES

FALSE

Science & Health

No, Earth Will Not Lose Gravity in August 2026: A 50-Year-Old Hoax Returns

The viral “Project Anchor” claim is a recycled hoax traceable to Patrick Moore’s 1976 BBC April Fool’s prank — supercharged by AI deepfakes and a real solar eclipse.

FILED FEB 18, 2026 · UPDATED JUL 11, 2026 · 60 SOURCES

FALSE

Investigative reports — not user-submitted fact-checks.