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  • 2021-11-15 (xsd:date)
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  • No, Bill Gates Did Not Call for Withdrawal of 'Dangerous' COVID-19 Vaccines (en)
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  • In the fall of 2021, Snopes readers asked us to clarify the facts surrounding widely shared online posts claiming that billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates — the subject of countless baseless COVID-19 and vaccine-related conspiracy theories — had made explosive and false claims that COVID-19 vaccines were far more dangerous than anyone imagined, and should be withdrawn from circulation. For example, on Aug. 30, 2021, the Malawian website Maravi Post published an article with the headline Shocking! Bill Gates calls for the withdrawal of all Covid-19 Vaccines; 'The vaccines are far more dangerous than anyone imagined.' Similar articles, screenshots and memes were shared widely, on Facebook in particular, from late August and onward. Those posts were erroneous. Gates had made no such remarks. The fabricated quotations, falsely attributed to him, actually originated in an article that was labelled as satire after it was first published, on the U.K. website TheExpose.uk (also known as TheDailyExpose.co.uk), which frequently publishes COVID-19 and vaccine-related conspiracy theories. As a result, we are issuing a rating of Originated as satire. When it was originally published on Aug. 29, The Daily Expose article reported that: The Daily Expose subsequently updated its post, adding the word SATIRE to the headline, as well as the rather significant qualifier In an alternative universe to the claim Bill Gates has called for the withdrawal of all COVID-19 vaccines. The piece was also given the following editor's note: ...When we first published this article we should have made it clear at the beginning that it was satire rather than at the end. We did not do this and we apologise... However, while The Daily Expose has updated its original piece to include satire labels, several other websites, which re-published the bogus story without any indication that it was supposedly intended to be humorous, have not followed suit. This is one of several reasons why we cover satire and humor — content is routinely stripped from its original content, leaving readers with mistaken impressions about its authenticity and accuracy. (en)
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