In Yemen, world's worst cholera outbreak traced to eastern Africa.

Explanation: Scientists have found that a strain of cholera causing an epidemic in Yemen – the worst in recorded history – came from eastern Africa and was probably borne into Yemen by migrants.

Using genomic sequencing techniques, researchers at Britain’s Wellcome Sanger Institute and France’s Institut Pasteur also said they should now be better able to estimate the risk of future cholera outbreaks in regions like Yemen, giving health authorities more time to intervene. “Knowing how cholera moves globally gives us the opportunity to better prepare for future outbreaks,” said Nick Thomson, a professor at Sanger and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who co-led the work. Nearly four years of war between a Saudi-led coalition and the Iranian-aligned Houthi group have crippled healthcare and sanitation systems in Yemen, where some 1.2 million suspected cholera cases have been reported since 2017, with 2,515 deaths. The World Health Organization (WHO) warned in October that the outbreak is accelerating again with roughly 10,000 suspected cases now reported per week, double the average rate for the first eight months of 2018. To explore the origins of the outbreak, Sanger and Pasteur team sequenced the genomes of cholera bacteria samples collected in Yemen and nearby areas. They included samples from a Yemeni refugee center on the Saudi Arabia-Yemen border and 74 other cholera samples from South Asia, the Middle East and eastern and central Africa. The team, whose findings were published in the journal Nature on Wednesday, then compared these sequences to a global collection of more than 1,000 cholera samples and found that the strain causing the Yemen epidemic is related to one first seen in 2012 in South Asia that has spread globally. However, the Yemeni strain did not arrive directly from South Asia, the scientists found, but was circulating and causing outbreaks in eastern Africa in 2013-14, prior to appearing in Yemen in 2016. “Genomics enabled us to discover that the strain of cholera behind the devastating and ongoing epidemic in Yemen is likely linked to the migration of people from eastern Africa into Yemen,” said Thomson. He added, however, that from the samples available, the team was not able to pinpoint exactly which countries in eastern Africa the strain had come from.


The artificial sweetener Splenda was inadequately tested and is unsafe for human consumption.

Explanation: Claims that the artificial sweetener Splenda was inadequately tested and is unsafe for human consumption are at odds with numerous scientific studies.

Splenda is the trademarked brand name of a sucralose-based artificial sweetener which is several hundred times sweeter than ordinary table sugar (sucrose). According to legend, the discovery of sucralose was (like that of another artificial sweetener, aspartame) something of an accident that occurred by happenstance during the course of unrelated research:  The oddest manner in which a new sweetener came to light was when, one day in 1976, a foreign research student at King’s College in London misheard the instructions of his supervisor, Professor L. Hough. Hough was searching for possible synthetic industrial applications of sucrose, the common sugar of cane and beet, and several derivatives had been produced in the laboratory. One of these was a trichlorosucrose (sucrose into which three atoms of chlorine had been introduced). Hough asked Shashikant Phadnis to ‘test’ the substance, but, his ear being imperfectly attuned to the language, Phadnis instead tasted it. Sucralose, as it became known, is one of the sweetest of all substances and can replace sucrose at less than one-thousandth of the concentration. After gaining approval by regulatory agencies in the U.S. and Canada (and other countries) in the 1990s, sucralose-based Splenda overtook aspartame-based Equal and NutraSweet and saccharin-based Sweet’N Low as the leading brand in the U.S. artificial sweetener market. The advantages of sucralose over regular sugar are many: it is so sweet that it can be used in much smaller quantities than sugar, it contains no calories, it has no harmful effect on teeth, it can be safely consumed by diabetics, and it is heat-stable and therefore suitable for use in baked goods. In the years since then, sucralose has (like aspartame before it) become the target of false claims that it is “unnatural” and therefore unsafe:  Before you reach for a packet of Splenda (sucralose), think twice. Don’t be fooled by its slogan “Made from sugar, so it tastes like sugar.” Sucralose was approved for use in foods as a sweetener in 1998. Before approving sucralose, the FDA claimed to have reviewed 110 human and animal studies, but it turns out that only 2 out of those studies were actually on humans. “It is a chlorinated artificial sweetener in line with aspartame and saccharin, and with detrimental health effects to match,” explains Dr. Joseph Mercola. Let’s look as some of the potential health risks associated to Splenda. Reported symptoms: Seizures, Dizziness, Migraines, Allergic reactions, Weight gain and increases in blood sugar, Blurred vision, Gastrointestinal issues. The reason it is so important to know about the effects of sucralose is because it is the number one selling artificial sweetener in America today. Most of the controversy surrounding Splenda is the way it is advertised. “The sugar industry is currently suing McNeil Nutritionals for implying that Splenda is a natural form of sugar with no calories,” Mercola adds. What is sucralose really? The truth is that sucralose does start off as sugar, but it is what happens after that is the problem. In the factory, three chlorine molecules are added to the sugar molecule to make sucralose. This alters the chemical structure of the sugar, making it a molecule that does not exist in nature. Because it doesn’t exist in nature, the body does not metabolize or digest this molecule. If our bodies were able to metabolize it, then sucralose would no longer have zero calories. Such rumors, as UC Davis professor Carolyn de la Peña noted in her history of artificial sweeteners, have been fomented in part by the sweetener industry itself despite the established safety of those products:  The modern sweetener industry has thrived by regularly providing consumers with a new option and actively vilifying those that came before it as unnatural and very likely unsafe. The result of this approach, for consumers, is confusion. Obscured are the commonalities between these sweeteners that are, in the end, far more significant than the differences. All are chemicals. None has a closer connection to nature, in either origins or processing, than any other. And all are safe, if used in moderation. Were that not the case, certainly industry-driven scientists would have discovered their competitors’ weaknesses and publicized them to consumers well before Internet activists and independent filmmakers. As is typical in Internet-circulated food health warnings like the example reproduced above (which was largely cribbed from a seventeen-year-old article originally published on the questionable mercola.com web site), all of the information it presents is inaccurate, misleading, and/or outdated. The notion that sucralose has not been subjected to a reasonable and sufficient amount of safety testing is, in particular, woefully inaccurate. Sucralose has, across the span of many years, been subjected to extensive batteries of short-term and long-term studies in both animals and humans (more than a hundred of which were reviewed during the FDA approval process for sucralose), and none of them has demonstrated any significant risk to humans associated with the consumption of sucralose in normal amounts. A human tolerance study published in the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology in 2000, for example, found “no indication that adverse effects on human health would occur from frequent or long-term exposure to sucralose at the maximum anticipated levels of intake”:  Two tolerance studies were conducted in healthy human adult volunteers. The first study was an ascending dose study conducted in eight subjects, in which sucralose was administered at doses of 1, 2.5, 5 and 10mg/kg at 48-hour intervals and followed by daily dosing at 2mg/kg for 3 days and 5mg/kg for 4 days. In the second study, subjects consumed either sucralose (n=77) or fructose (50g/day) (n=31) twice daily in single blind fashion. Sucralose dosage levels were 125mg/day for weeks 1-3, 250mg/day during weeks 4-7, and 500mg/day during weeks 8-12. No adverse experiences or clinically detectable effects were attributable to sucralose in either study. Similarly, haematology, serum biochemistry, urinalysis and EKG tracings were unaffected by sucralose administration. In the 13-week study, serial slit lamp ophthalmologic examination performed in a random subset of the study groups revealed no changes. Fasting and 2-hour post-dosing blood sucralose concentrations obtained daily during week 12 of the study revealed no rising trend for blood sucralose. Sucralose was well tolerated by human volunteers in single doses up to 10mg/kg/day and repeated doses increasing to 5mg/kg/day for 13 weeks. Based on these studies and the extensive animal safety database, there is no indication that adverse effects on human health would occur from frequent or long-term exposure to sucralose at the maximum anticipated levels of intake. The chapter on sucralose in the textbook Artificial Sweeteners also surveys the extensive body of safety testing that has been performed on sucralose, including those involving long-term exposure and doses far in excess of recommended amounts:  Sucralose is one of the most tested food ingredients available today. It has been found safe for its intended use by health and food safety experts from around the world. Sucralose is permitted for use in more than 100 countries. It is used in thousands of food and beverage products worldwide and is safe for use over an entire lifetime. More than 100 scientific studies conducted to describe the safety of sucralose represent a methodical, intentional, and broad-range research program, as required by prominent health and food safety authorities. [R]esearch studies conducted in describing the safety of a new food ingredient must be rigorous and comprehensive. The studies conducted to assess the safety of sucralose investigated possible effects with short-term exposures and long-term, essentially lifetime, exposures, from conception to advanced adulthood. Many of the sucralose research studies utilized very high daily doses of sucralose, doses far greater that what could be expected to be consumed, to understand margins for safe use. Use of such high daily doses was particularly employed in the core sucralose research studies, in accordance with international standards for studies designed to determine potential risk. The most frequently cited study supposedly documenting the harmful effects of sucralose was one (conducted with rats, not humans, and funded by the Sugar Association) published in the Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health in 2008 that reportedly found Splenda might “contribute to obesity, destroy ‘good’ intestinal bacteria and prevent prescription drugs from being absorbed.”  However, even that study was refuted by one published the following year in Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology which reported that an Expert Panel had found that the previous study was “deficient in several critical areas” and that its conclusions “are not consistent with published literature and not supported by the data presented”:  A recent study in rats investigated the retail sweetener product, Granulated SPLENDA No Calorie Sweetener (Splenda). The investigators reported that Splenda increased body weight, decreased beneficial intestinal bacteria, and increased the expression of certain cytochrome P450 (CYP450) enzymes and the transporter protein, P-glycoprotein (P-gp), the latter of which was considered evidence that Splenda or sucralose might interfere with the absorption of nutrients and drugs. The investigators indicated that the reported changes were attributable to the sucralose present in the product tested. An Expert Panel conducted a rigorous evaluation of this study. In arriving at its conclusions, the Expert Panel considered the design and conduct of the study, its outcomes and the outcomes reported in other data available publicly. The Expert Panel found that the study was deficient in several critical areas and that its results cannot be interpreted as evidence that either Splenda, or sucralose, produced adverse effects in male rats, including effects on gastrointestinal microflora, body weight, CYP450 and P-gp activity, and nutrient and drug absorption. The study conclusions are not consistent with published literature and not supported by the data presented. The reference to sucralose’s being “a molecule that does not exist in nature,” one that “the body does not metabolize or digest” is both inaccurate and relatively meaningless. The fact that the human body does not metabolize sucralose for energy is a positive: it’s what makes sucralose non-caloric and therefore ideal as an artificial sweetener. Most sucralose is unabsorbed and therefore passes harmlessly through the body; a relatively small amount (~15%) of consumed sucralose is absorbed but is excreted via urination with no harmful effects:  In the body, sucralose is not able to be digested for energy. Further, sucralose is relatively poorly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract (GIT). The GIT is replete with enzymes that facilitate rapid uptake of monosaccharides; however, there is no digestion of sucralose at the level of the GIT (or elsewhere in the body). Thus, these enzymes have no impact on sucralose absorption, and specific studies show no active uptake of sucralose. About 85% of consumed sucralose is unabsorbed from the GIT and excreted unchanged in stool. A small amount (approximately 15%) of consumed sucralose is absorbed via passive diffusion across the GIT lumen. Consistent with sucralose being a highly water soluble, small and relatively inert substance, absorbed sucralose is distributed to essentially all tissues and readily excreted in urine. There is no active transport into milk, transplacentally, or across the blood-brain barrier into the central nervous system. Sucralose is not used as a source of energy. It is not dechlorinated, and there is no evidence of degradation to any smaller chlorinated compounds. Sucralose does not bind to proteins in the body, consistent with its relatively non-reactive nature. Most absorbed sucralose, and all unabsorbed sucralose, is excreted unchanged within 24 hours. As is also typical with Internet-circulated food health warnings, the accompanying laundry list of “reported symptoms” should be taken with many grains of salt. Self-reported adverse events are simply anecdotal raw data; there is no certainty that the reported events were actually due to the product consumed, much less that they demonstrate a causal relationship between the product and the reported events (especially after consumers are influenced by reading anti-sucralose reports that list what symptoms they’re “supposed” to be experiencing). Such determinations cannot be made until reports have been investigated, evaluated, and analyzed, and no studies have confirmed that the symptoms listed are a common reaction to sucralose. As Dr. Joe Schwarz observed in his work on food myths and misconceptions:  As with any substance, there can be no absolute guarantee about the safety of sucralose for everyone. Any food or additive, be it peanuts or apples, aspartame or sucralose, can cause a problem for some people. But reactions to sucralose are rare indeed. There is one thing this piece did get right, although it’s both outdated and irrelevant to the issue of the safety of sucralose: the manufacturer of Splenda was indeed sued (nearly fourteen years ago) by a competitor over their slogan “made from sugar, so it tastes like sugar,” which falsely implied to consumers that Splenda “in some way actually was sugar, but with the calories stripped out”:  In November 2004, Merisant, manufacturer of the table-top, aspartame-based sweetener Equal, sued McNeil Nutritionals, a division of Johnson and Johnson and the manufacturer of Splenda, for false and misleading advertising in Splenda’s “made from sugar, so it tastes like sugar” campaign. Merisant invoked the Lanham Act, which prohibits false or misleading advertisements to American consumers, to stop McNeil from making several claims in television and print advertisements that suggested that Splenda was like sugar, only with the calories removed. After three years of fighting in the courts, Johnson and Johnson settled, just before the jury was to return what appeared to be a ruling awarding damages in favor of the plaintiff. Sucralose, the chemical in the brand-named product Splenda, does, in fact, originate with the sucrose (sugar) molecule. It then undergoes a process of molecule replacement, however, that renders it qualitatively different. After the lawsuit was settled, Splenda debuted a new slogan: “Just What’s Good — it’s made from sugar. It tastes like sugar. But it’s not sugar.” On 11 March 2016, numerous news outlets reported that an Italian study (published in January 2016) purportedly documented a link between Splenda and cancer in mice. The International Food Information Council (IFIC), a non-profit group aimed at providing science-based evidence with respect to food safety, addressed the publication of the study in an article that criticized the study’s methodology and dissonant findings:  As Trevor Butterworth expertly articulated during the last unsupported sucralose scare from these researchers: The problem hanging over the Splenda finding is that which hangs over the Ramazzini Institute in general: Quality control. No matter what substance the Institute tests for cancer, the results always seem to be positive, whereas other laboratories testing the same substances repeatedly fail to come up with the same findings. […] All of this has made the Ramazzini Institute something of a joke in European and American science. But, of course, there’s nothing to laugh about when you use a charity conference on childhood cancer to promote an international cancer panic. The FDA and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) have both come out on the Ramazzini Institute?s previous work, saying that their conclusions aren’t supported by the data. Dr. Magnuson summed it up perfectly: “There are many other problems with this study that we could discuss, such as diet formulation, doses used, lack of dose response, and so on — but the critical point is that it has been well documented that the results from studies by this laboratory are not valid — especially when it comes to lymphoma and leukemia.”  IFIC concluded that the “safety and effectiveness of sucralose (and other low-calorie sweeteners in foods) is incredibly well supported,” and added that “you shouldn’t hesitate to swap them into your diet” in efforts to reduce caloric intake. On 11 March 2016, Splenda issues a statement via their Facebook page referencing the IFIC article and asserting the Italian study’s conclusion was an outlier among dozens to the contrary:  Researchers have conducted more than 100 scientific studies on the safety of sucralose over the past 20 years, and they’ve all declared sucralose safe to enjoy. Sometimes, however, poorly conducted and unscientific studies make bold headlines and stir up safety fears. This [IFIC] article sets the record straight[.]


Congo Ebola epidemic exceeds 1,000 cases: health ministry.

Explanation: Congo’s Ebola epidemic has now exceeded 1,000 cases, the Health Ministry said on Monday, with a death toll of 629 in the world’s second worst ever outbreak.

Health workers have been better prepared than ever for this latest epidemic of the hemorrhagic fever, which causes severe vomiting, diarrhea and bleeding, and kills more than half those it infects. New technologies like a trial vaccine, experimental treatments and futuristic cube-shaped mobile units for treating patients have helped curb the spread of the virus. But public mistrust and rampant insecurity in the parts of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo where Ebola has struck have hampered the response, complicating the fight against it. Five Ebola centers have been attacked since last month, sometimes by armed assailants. The violence led French medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) to suspend its activities at the epicenter of the outbreak last month. As a result, it is now the second-deadliest in history, behind the 2013-16 one in West Africa that is believed to have killed more than 11,000 people. “The total is now 1,009 cases,” the ministry said in a statement, but it added: “the response, led by the Health Ministry in collaboration with its partners, has limited the geographical spread.”  Last Wednesday, authorities confirmed a case of Ebola in Bunia, another city of close to 1 million people.


When U.S. President Donald Trump was asked what he'd say to people who lost family members to COVID-19, he replied, "I would say this didn't hurt anyone as much as it hurt me.

Explanation: According to the transcript of that interview, Trump was asked the following by Muir: “We’ve lost more people now [to COVID-19] than we lost in the Vietnam War. What do you want to say to those families tonight?” Trump responded in full as reproduced below:

One of the primary issues that the U.S. federal and state governments were wrestling with during the COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic in May 2020 was the trade-off of keeping social distancing and business closure restrictions in place to protect lives, versus the trade-off of ongoing (and possibly permanent) economic harm to individuals, businesses, and the country as a whole. On May 5, 2020, while U.S. President Donald Trump was in Phoenix, Arizona, to tour a medical face mask manufacturing facility there, he was interviewed by David Muir of ABC News about the subject of reopening the U.S.:   Shortly after the interview aired, a meme began to circulate on social media holding that when Trump had been asked during that interview what he’d say to people who lost family members to COVID-19, he replied, “I would say this didn’t hurt anyone as much as it hurt me”:  Although this meme is vaguely reflective of something Trump said during that interview, it grossly misrepresents both what he literally said and what he meant.


Blogger Says Vicks VapoRub caused a child’s death.

Global News Service, Children, Fake news, Health Care, Bloggers,

Here’s a scary story. A mother in Mexico thinks that her 2-year-old has a cold and puts Vicks VapoRub on his chest and under his nose. She lies down next to him and when she wakes, she finds the child dead. The tale began moving through the Web in November. Smag31.com, a website that targets young mothers, carried it on Nov. 25 with the headline, "Mom applies a remedy to her baby, moments later he dies." But so far as anyone can tell, the story is untrue. Vicks VapoRub has been tied to breathing problems in infants and toddlers, but not to any deaths. The post was flagged by Facebook users as part of the social media giant’s crackdown on fake news. Bruce Rubin, chair of the Department of Pediatrics at Virginia Commonwealth University, has followed questions about Vicks VapoRub for a decade. In 2009, he published a peer-reviewed article based on a case he had encountered a few years before. The parents of an 18-month-old had put Vicks under the child’s nose and the child immediately stopped breathing. They quickly turned the child upside down, slapped it on the back and it coughed up a plug of mucus. Its breathing returned to normal. But Rubin told us that in the 10 years since that case, he’s seen no report of any deaths. On the other hand, episodes of breathing distress while rare, are not unheard of. "I understand that there have been about 30 such reports, all with Vicks under the nose of very small children," Rubin said. "Procter and Gamble (the maker of Vicks) specifically states never to use this directly under the nose at any age, and never use at all in children under the age of 2." To underscore, that is what the label says. Never under the nose. Never with kids under 2. A 2012 study looked at what happens when menthol, one of Vicks’ active ingredients, is inhaled. It found that the body responds by making more mucus, but again, the authors cited no example of a child actually dying. Jennifer Lowry, head of toxicology at Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City and chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ environmental health council, said, "I have never heard, nor could I find a report of, a patient dying from inhaling Vicks VapoRub." Lowry said as a pediatric medical toxicologist, she has concerns about any product that contains camphor, as Vicks does. But her main worry is that parents will do exactly the wrong thing and have kids eat it. That’s very dangerous. Procter and Gamble spokeswoman Velvet Gogol Bennett said the company has never had a family report a fatality due to inhaling Vicks VapoRub. "We have had no local health authority notification, no hospital notification, nor any doctor or any official news organization anywhere in the world has brought this case to our attention," Bennett said. "Despite all of our efforts to investigate this social media posting, there is no verifiable information in terms of city and name of the person concerned." The blog post about the alleged death said, "The medical report stated the child died due to inflammation in the respiratory track, produced by the camphor contained in the famous ointment." If such a medical report exists, no researcher we contacted seems to have ever seen it. We reached out to the author behind the blog and did not hear back. The myth-busting website Snopes also looked into this and found it lacked substance. A Canadian study looked at cases of children eating Vicks or similar products. Those situations sent children to the emergency room, but were not fatal. The one exception was in 1983 involving a child with pneumonia whose parents had given him a home remedy that contained camphor and alcohol. Rubin said if people follow instructions, Vicks is fine: "If you are an adult with a stuffy head cold, putting Vicks on your chest and drinking some hot tea with honey (and perhaps rum) is as good a medicine as it gets. Just keep the Vicks (and the rum) away from the under-2 crowd." Our ruling A blog post said that Vicks VapoRub caused a child’s death in Mexico. While the product has been tied to breathing problems in infants and toddlers, there is no evidence that it has been fatal.


Donald Trump Says that “over a 45-minute period that we had the press conference” on the coronavirus on March 13, 2020, the stock market set "an all-time record.

Explanation: The Dow had a record-high point increase on the day Trump declared a national emergency in response to coronavirus, with the surge accelerating during his late-afternoon news conference. But that followed a record point decrease the previous day. And it was followed by a sharp drop by the opening of the next trading day, which saw continued declines before closing.

President Donald Trump bragged that his March 13, 2020, statements about coronavirus had record-breaking influence on the stock market. Wearing a baseball hat with "USA" emblazoned on the front, Trump told reporters gathered at the White House a day later on March 14, 2020: "I was honored to see that the stock market — you were mostly there with us — set a record in a short period of time, over a 45-minute period that we had the press conference yesterday in the Rose Garden. That was a record; all-time record. I think we should do one of them every day, perhaps. How about five times a day? We’ll do one five times a day. But that was something to watch and — I had no idea. We walked back, I said, ‘So, how did that work out?’ They said, ‘Sir, you just set a new record in the history of the stock market.’ So, that was pretty good." The market did make a record surge on March 13, 2020, and the surge accelerated during Trump’s news conference that afternoon. But that record came a day after the steepest decline ever. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, the most popular measure of the stock market, gained 1,985 points on Friday, March 13. That was its biggest point gain ever, with the "late-day surge" coming "while Trump was speaking," the Associated Press reported. The business and financial news network CNBC and other news organizations reported the same. In his remarks, Trump declared the coronavirus pandemic a national emergency, announced greater availability of testing in the coming days and announced the purchase of oil for the strategic petroleum reserve — steps that may have helped lift the Dow. His Rose Garden news conference started at 3:30 p.m. EDT and lasted an hour and 11 minutes, including remarks given by members of Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force. At the start of the speech, the Dow was at 21,747.52. By the market’s close at 4 p.m., while Trump’s news conference was continuing, it was at 23,175.92, for a gain of 1,428 points over the course of the speech. That gain itself was larger than the previous record for the largest point gain in a day — 1,293.96 points on March 2, 2020. "Stocks rallied, shooting sharply upward in the last half-hour of trading as investors appeared to gain confidence that the Trump administration has a plan to combat the outbreak from both a health care and economic perspective," AP reported. But that upward acceleration followed a record decline, as news organizations also reported. As Barron’s put it: "The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted 10% on Thursday, marking its biggest one-day percentage (and point) drop since the Black Monday stock market crash in 1987." The rally "only recovered most of the losses suffered a day earlier," MarketWatch reported, adding that the Dow is "in a bear market." It’s also worth noting that those gains were fleeting. The increases of March 13 were wiped out by the next trading day, Monday, March 16, when the Dow dropped like a rock and opened 2,240 points down at 20,935.70 and then fell another 248 points by the market’s close. Such sharp rises and declines are common during times of stress in the economy. "One good day was really more of a dead-cat bounce, as the market fell still further after that," Tulane University business professor Peter Ricchiuti told PolitiFact. "Also, the stock market is not the economy. It’s a measure of projected corporate profits. Very different things." Kathleen Day, lecturer at the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School and author of a book on financial crises, said in an interview: "The big picture here is the stock market is gyrating. It’s unstable because of the virus itself and because of the lack of leadership (from Trump). The market wouldn’t have gone up so much if it hadn’t gone down so much." The White House didn’t respond to our requests for information. Trump didn’t specify what type of record was set, but a point gain is one  legitimate measure. At the same time, large point gains and declines are natural when the Dow is at a high number. The index was marching toward 30,000 just a few weeks earlier. Stock watchers pay more attention to percentage changes on a given day or over time as a sign of the market’s strength. On that score, the gain for the day of Trump’s news conference was the largest percentage increase since October 2008. Trump said that "over a 45-minute period that we had the press conference" on the coronavirus on March 13, 2020, the stock market set "an all-time record." The Dow Jones Industrial Average registered its largest-ever point gain on March 13, with gains accelerating during Trump’s news conference. But that occurred one day after the Dow’s biggest point decline ever, and the gains were wiped out the next trading day. Trump’s statement is partially accurate, but leaves out important details. We rate this .


THC will be removed from drug-test screenings “starting on August 30th.”

Explanation: What's true:  This claim refers specifically to a medical marijuana law in the state of Oklahoma. What's false: The law changes nothing for people who are not in Oklahoma and/or who do not have a valid medical-marijuana license.

In late August 2019, a screenshot from a local news broadcast shared alongside the text “THC will be removed from substance charts for drug test screenings starting August 30th” went viral:  THC is the primary active component of cannabis. As this photo spread across the internet, its context appeared to have been lost. Some users shared the image thinking it applied only to certain states. Others took it to mean that this was a nationwide legal change. Most commenters appeared to have assumed the claim referred to all potential users of cannabis. In reality, the claim that THC will be removed from drug-test screenings starting Aug. 30 (2019) applied only to people who are residents of Oklahoma and who have valid medical-marijuana licenses (note the Oklahoma City-based KOCO 5 television station logo appearing in the above screenshot). The law in question — Senate Bill 2612 — was introduced in the Oklahoma legislature on Feb. 4, and was signed into law by Gov. Kevin Stitt on March 14. A lengthy compromise bill about the future of medical marijuana in that state, the law does stipulate that “no employer may refuse to hire, discipline, discharge or otherwise penalize an applicant or employee solely on the basis of a positive test for marijuana components or metabolites” unless: According to The Oklahoman, the law actually took effect on Aug. 29, 2019. Because the law applies only to a very narrow subset of the American population despite being shared across the country without these caveats.


Utah governor criticizes federal marijuana reform inaction.

Explanation: Utah’s governor has criticized federal lawmakers for moving too slowly on marijuana policy reform.

Utah, Marijuana, Gary Herbert, Medical marijuana

The Salt Lake Tribune reported Thursday that Gov. Gary Herbert says the federal classification of cannabis as a schedule 1 drug interferes with research into its potential medicinal uses and prevents regular pharmacies from dispensing it. The classification puts marijuana in the same category as heroin and LSD. The Republican says the federal government “oughta be ashamed” for the “lack of action and attention” to the issue. Utah voters passed a ballot initiative in 2018 to create a medical cannabis program and state legislators followed by instituting their own marijuana law. Herbert says the state’s medical marijuana program faces policies that hinder doctors and federal banking restrictions forcing marijuana vendors to operate as cash-only businesses. ___ Information from: The Salt Lake Tribune, http://www.sltrib.com


Obamacare "will provide insurance to all non-U.S. residents, even if they are here illegally.

Immigration, Health Care, Florida, Chain email,

There are no graveyards for ridiculous, oft-debunked chain emails. A lengthy, widespread email keeps resurfacing with dire warnings about Obamacare as determined by Judge David Kithil of Marble Falls, Texas. "Please for the sake of many good people, please... pass this on," the email begs. "We all need to be informed." Unfortunately, the email is riddled with errors, starting with the fact that is referring to an initial 2009 health care proposal that never became law. Still, because it has the subject line "Obama Care Outrage," we thought people might confuse it with the health care law on the books. In that context, and given all the talk about potential immigration reform, one line jumped out: "The bill will provide insurance to all non-U.S. residents, even if they are here illegally," the email states. Make no mistake, this line is wrong in the context of the 2009 law (! wrong, in fact), and wrong in the context of the health care bill President Barack Obama signed into law in 2010. Let us explain. The Affordable Care Act contains an individual mandate that requires individuals to purchase health insurance. It allows U.S. citizens and legal residents to purchase insurance on health insurance exchanges, often receiving tax credits. But none of it applies to people who are here illegally. They don’t have to follow the mandate because they shouldn’t be here. They remain ineligible for regular Medicaid coverage, just as they are ineligible for food stamps. They cannot obtain coverage through state-based health insurance exchanges (thus, they are also ineligible for tax credits to offset the cost of getting that coverage). Now, certain low-income illegal immigrants are eligible for emergency Medicaid coverage, including childbirth and surgery. And federal law requires hospitals not to turn away individuals for emergency treatment, even if they are uninsured (or undocumented), according to the National Immigration Law Center. But those policies predate the Affordable Care Act. "They don’t get health insurance, which is coverage, which is different than a hospital getting reimbursed for Medicaid," said Laura Goodhue, executive director of Florida Chain, a consumer health advocacy group. The Affordable Care Act does provide some benefits for certain legal non-U.S. citizens. We repeat: Legal. Immigrants who are in the country legally are subject to the mandate and are eligible to shop on the exchanges. Thanks to the Supreme Court and Florida legislators, certain poor, legal noncitizens have it a little easier in Florida than the state's most impoverished citizens. The law includes a special rule (page 108) allowing them to get tax credits to purchase health insurance on an exchange if they (a) do not qualify for Medicaid because they have not been here for the required five years and (b) earn at or below the poverty line. Meanwhile, about 1 million of Florida’s poorest citizens will continue not to have affordable access to health insurance. They are not eligible to receive tax credits for the exchanges, and Florida leaders did not expand Medicaid coverage to include them during the 2013 legislative session. Goodhue calls it a "black hole" of coverage. Republican Gov. Jan Brewer had noticed a similar scenario playing out in Arizona if its leaders did not expand Medicaid, saying, "For poor Arizonans below 100 percent of the federal poverty level, only legal immigrants, but not citizens, would be eligible for subsidies." Our ruling The chain email says that Obamacare provides insurance "to all non-U.S. residents, even if they are here illegally." It’s actually citing a 2009 proposal that didn’t pass, but that doesn’t really matter. The email’s wrong either way. The Affordable Care Act does nothing to provide health insurance to anyone living in the United States illegally. It does offer some assistance to legal non-U.S. citizens, which by the way is different than a non-U.S. resident as the email claims. (A non-U.S. resident could be living in Mexico, France or even Mars). We rate this claim !


Post-war Liberians are demanding better mental health care.

Explanation: More than a decade after back-to-back civil wars ravaged Liberia its people still await justice for countless abuses, and many say the lack of accountability is worsening a mental health crisis.

Liberia, Mental health, Health, General News, George Weah, Africa, Monrovia, West Africa, War crimes, International News

The frustration soared when President George Weah recently indicated there was no need for his government to set up a war crimes court in the West African nation where the conflicts killed a quarter-million people. “Why now?” he repeated in an address to the United Nations annual gathering of world leaders last month. The impatience with that attitude boiled over last month when hundreds of people stormed Liberia’s legislature with a petition asking the government for more mental health support. They said they represented some half-million people who have received mental health services over the years via a charity, the U.S.-based Carter Center. Such private aid is not enough to assure that every Liberian receives assistance, they said. “Mental health care continues to be seriously sidelined,” said Bill Ballah, a spokesman for the group. “Each of us needs good mental health to ... pursue our life goals and meet our responsibilities as responsible citizens.” Critics say Liberia’s president is not interested in creating a war crimes court because his political support base includes some elements who committed atrocities. Weah has rejected that accusation and his supporters dismiss it as untrue. In addition to those suffering from trauma caused by the civil wars from 1989 to 2003, thousands of Liberians are trying to recover from the world’s deadliest Ebola outbreak that killed more than 4,000 people in the country from 2014-2016. More than 20% of Liberia’s post-war population has mental health issues including post-traumatic stress disorder, the World Health Organization said in 2016. But the country has just a couple of psychiatrists for a population of nearly 5 million. Until the arrival of a Nigerian psychiatrist three years ago, Dr. Benjamin Harris had been the only psychiatrist in Liberia for decades. About 70% of students Harris interviewed near the end of the civil wars said they had seen people killed or tortured. About 60% said they had lost confidence in human beings and society. “This can have a severe consequence on one’s mental function,” he told The Associated Press. The need for mental health care in Liberia is so great and complicated that no government has been able to tackle the issue, and none has taken the initiative, Harris said. Government authorities acknowledge the mental health problem is enormous but blame the country’s inability to raise enough revenue to address such issues. The chairman of the senate committee on health and a former health minister, Dr. Peter Coleman, said the funding allotted to the health sector in the annual budget is negligible because there are competing priorities. “When it comes to mental health right now, it’s collaborations with agencies such as the Carter Center that is helping us to at least do the rudimentary things in mental health,” he said. Dr. David Henderson, chairman of the psychiatry department at Boston University’s medical school, said mental health could be tackled more rigorously in places like Liberia if global health funding paid more attention to psychiatry. If those resources were provided, “we can really build capacity very quickly.” He cited the success story of Ethiopia, which went from just three psychiatrists to about 100 over 15 years. For now Liberia has just one overcrowded and underfunded mental health hospital, an annex of the John F. Kennedy Memorial Medical Center in the capital, Monrovia. Patients are charged the equivalent of $10 for 21 days of treatment, a cost many cannot afford. Meanwhile the Catherine Mills Rehabilitation Center, a facility set up in pre-war Liberia as a home for people with mental illness, was ransacked and looted during the civil war and has never reopened. Officials have tried in vain to persuade people now living amid its ruins to leave. ___ Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa


The stimulus bill contains "$20 million for the removal of small to medium-sized fish passage barriers" and "$25 million to rehabilitate off-roading trails for ATVs.

Explanation: Stimulus has money to help fish, off-roaders

National, Economy, Federal Budget, Stimulus, Mike Pence,

In a speech on the House floor on Feb. 3, 2009, Republican Rep. Mike Pence sounded off about what's in the stimulus bill before Congress. "In legislation before the Senate this week, $20 million for the removal of small to medium-sized fish passage barriers or $25 million to rehabilitate off-roading trails for ATVs is not going to put this economy back on track," Pence said. "And, it was exactly that kind of wasteful government spending that resulted in unanimous Republican opposition last week." We wanted to check to see if the bill includes the money Pence mentioned. Some of our previous reports have shown that opponents of the bill have not been  completely   truthful  about what's in the bill. In this case, Pence is right. The Senate report on the bill, as of this writing, includes $20 million "for the removal of small- to medium-sized fish passage barriers," which means  clearing barriers  in rivers and streams to allow fish migration. It's part of an overall $190 million for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for habitat restoration projects that "accomplish ecological goals and provide employment opportunities in the local communities." The report also says the projects can be modified to "achieve the goals of maximum job creation and most effective use of resources." Similarly, the $25 million for recreation maintenance, "especially for rehabilitation of off-road vehicle routes," is part of an overall $135 million for the Bureau of Land Management, which includes funding for trail maintenance, remediation for environmental and public safety hazards on public lands, and habitat restoration. This passage also allows for modification for "the goals of maximum job creation and most effective use of resources." A Democratic spokesman defended the funding when we asked about Pence's criticism. "Preserving our national parks and preserving our wildlife don't seem to be unreasonable goals," said Rob Blumenthal, a Democratic spokesman for the Senate Committee on Appropriations. "These are ready-to-go jobs that will employ American workers." The Fish and Wildlife Service said the work to remove fish barriers is "shovel ready" and includes projects like building bypasses around large dams and demolishing obsolete mill runs that date back to colonial times. "There's going to be a lot of work for local contractors," said Fish and Wildlife spokesman Chris Tollefson. "We're talking about restoring native fish runs all over the country." We'll let others decide if the projects are worthy or not. We should point out that almost any job the government pays someone to do is technically stimulating the economy by creating income and reducing unemployment, if only by the smallest amount. Also, the two projects combined account for not even 1 percent of the bill — more like .005 percent. Nevertheless, $45 million for most people is serious money. When he made his remarks, Pence had his facts straight on what was in the legislation — $20 million for fish-barrier removal and $25 million for off-road trails.


Former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, the author of “American Sniper,” shot   looters in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, shot two carjackers in   Texas, and punched Jesse Ventura in the face.

Explanation: Chris Kyle Shot Looters, Carjackers, Punched Jesse Ventura

With the blockbuster success of the film American Sniper, the legacy of   former NAVY SEAL Chris Kyle has taken on mythic proportions. As is often   the case when this happens, some events of Kyle’s life have been   embellished and exaggerated in the re-telling of old stories and   accounts. Chris Kyle is the most decorated and revered sniper in American military history and had more than 150 confirmed   kills during his time in Iraq and Afghanistan. Kyle’s heroism and service give reason to celebrate his life, however, the public and   media often seek even more from legendary figures like Kyle. The truth   often blurs in the telling and retelling of legendary figures’ stories,   and Kyle is no different. Here’s a look at how some of the most common claims about Kyle got   started, and whether or not they’re true:  Claims about the historical accuracy of American Sniper  Claims about the accuracy of American Sniper are off base. Clint   Eastwood, the film’s director, said it portrays one soldier’s   perspective of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — not an objective,   historically accurate account. The Star  reports:  “Still, in making American Sniper, which he took over after Steven Spielberg bowed out due to budget restrictions, Eastwood felt he had to properly represent Kyle’s version of events. ‘This picture was interesting, because I’m seeing it from the point of a person who was sort of an American hero, as far as his ability to be this ultra-sniper. And his family and his beliefs were very strong about defending the country and defending the guys who are defending the country, as a sort of an oversight warrior. It was an important story, but you have to embrace his philosophy if you’re going to tell a story about him,’ Clint Eastwood said.”  Chris Kyle Killed Looters During Hurricane Katrina  The claim that Chris Kyle killed 30 looters in New Orleans from a perch   on top of the Superdome in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina is false. The rumor started after Chris Kyle reportedly told the  story to a private group of Navy SEALS after a moderated   discussion with SOFREP, a website that covers special-operations   forces. The New Yorker  reports:  “(After the discussion), a larger group went out for dinner, closed the hotel bar, and hung out in Kyle’s suite, drinking until late. The SEALs began telling stories, and Kyle offered a shocking one. In the days after Hurricane Katrina, he said, the law-and-order situation was dire. He and another sniper travelled to New Orleans, set up on top of the Superdome, and proceeded to shoot dozens of armed residents who were contributing to the chaos. Three people shared with me varied recollections of that evening: the first said that Kyle claimed to have shot thirty men on his own; according to the second, the story was that Kyle and the other sniper had shot thirty men between them; the third said that she couldn’t recall specific details. A spokesperson for the U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) told the   New Yorker that “no West Coast SEALs deployed to Katrina.” One of Chris   Kyle’s superiors said he’d never heard the story, and he added that it   “defies the imagination” to believe that dozens of people were shot with   high-velocity rifles and then disappeared. Chris Kyle Killed Two Carjackers in Texas  The claim that Chris Kyle killed two carjackers in Texas is false. The  account first appeared in D Magazine in April of 2013:  “Two guys approached him with pistols and demanded his money and the keys to his truck. With his hands in the air, he sized up which man seemed most confident with his gun. He told the robbers that he just needed to reach back into the truck to get the keys. He turned around and reached under his winter coat instead, into his waistband. With his right hand, he grabbed his Colt 1911. He fired two shots under his left armpit, hitting the first man twice in the chest. Then he turned slightly and fired two more times, hitting the second man twice in the chest. Both men fell dead. Kyle leaned on his truck and waited for the police. When they arrived, they detained him while they ran his driver’s license. But instead of his name, address, and date of birth, what came up was a phone number at the Department of Defense. At the other end of the line was someone who explained that the police were in the presence of one of the most skilled fighters in U.S. military history. When they reviewed the surveillance footage, the officers found the incident had happened just as Kyle had described it. They were very understanding, and they didn’t want to drag a just-home, highly decorated veteran into a messy legal situation.”  D Magazine worked with Chris Kyle on the story, but the writer doesn’t   say that Kyle told him the story. In fact, the writer doesn’t say where   the account came from. A later  article in the New Yorker said Kyle told the story to friends   who later retold it to reporters. Either way, the incident likely didn’t   happen, the New Yorker reports:  “There is cause to be skeptical. The counties of Erath, Somervell, and Johnson cover the stretch of highway where the incident supposedly happened. Tommy Bryant, the sheriff of Erath County, told me that he could ‘guar-an-damn-tee it didn’t happen here.’ Greg Doyle, the sheriff of Somervell County, said that he had ‘never heard” the story, which he found “kinda shocking,’ and added, ‘It did not occur here.’ Bob Alford, the sheriff of Johnson County, told a local reporter, ‘If something like that happened here I would have heard of it, and I’m sure you all at the newspaper would have heard of it.’  “These denials do not automatically disprove the story, of course. And it’s true that certain operatives, from certain government offices and agencies, drive government-registered vehicles whose license plates prompt civilian authorities to contact a call center in the event of an accident or a traffic stop. But a SEAL with extensive experience in special-mission units told me that the notion of such a provision being in place for a former SEAL driving a private vehicle was ‘bull.’”  Chris Kyle Knocked Out Jesse Venture  This claim is false, and it landed Chris Kyle’s estate in federal court. In his memoir, Kyle told a story about punching an unnamed celebrity   called “Scruff Face” because the celebrity allegedly said that the SEALs   “deserved to lose a few” during the war. The Washington Post reports:  “Kyle did not identify Ventura by name in the book, but said that he swung at the individual after he ‘started running his mouth about the war and everything and anything he could connect to it.’ That included President George W. Bush and deployed SEALs, who ‘were doing the wrong thing, killing men and women and children and murdering,’ the man said, according to Kyle’s book. Ventura said the whole episode was fabricated. Kyle later said in media interviews while promoting his book that ‘Scruff Face’ was Ventura, who served in the Navy’s Underwater Demolition Teams during the Vietnam War era.”  Ventura said the incident didn’t happen and sued Chris Kyle and his   estate for defamation. At trial, Ventura’s lawyers successfully argued   that the made-up fight had drummed up publicity and interest in Kyle’s   book, which led to more book sales. Ventura’s lawyers pointed to a   picture of Ventura at the event in question that showed no black eye or   bruises, which contradicted Kyle’s account of the alleged fight. Witnesses also testified. A jury in Minnesota sided with Ventura and   awarded him $1.8 million in July of 2014, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports. Most of the proceeds from the “American Sniper” book were not donated to   veterans  It’s true that the vast majority of royalties generated by the sale of   Chris Kyle’s memoirs were not donated to the families of marines in   2013. After Chris Kyle was killed in early 2013, HarperCollins, the publisher   of his book, released a  statement that said Kyle had “dedicated his life in recent   years to supporting veterans and donated the proceeds of American Sniper   to the families of his fallen friends.”  But Chris Kyle’s widow, Taya, testified in court in July of 2014 that   although the couple didn’t intend to profit from the book, they had. The   Kyles planned to donate much of the book’s $3 million in royalties to   veterans and their families, Taya Kyle said, but they couldn’t because   of gift tax laws that prevented them from giving more than $13,000 to   each family in 2013. The National Review  estimates that $52,000 (or about 2% of American Snipers’ 2013   royalties) had gone to the families of fallen veterans.


Viral posts claim that climate change is a "made-up catastrophe.

Explanation: The U.S. Department of Justice examined using fentanyl in lethal injections as it prepared last year to resume executing condemned prisoners, a then untested use of the powerful, addictive opioid that has helped fuel a national crisis of overdose deaths.

The department revealed it had contemplated using the drug in a court filing last month, which has not been previously reported. In the end, it decided against adopting the drug for executions. Attorney General William Barr announced in July his department instead would use pentobarbital, a barbiturate, when it resumes federal executions later this year, ending a de facto moratorium on the punishment put in place by the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama. But the special consideration given to the possibilities of fentanyl, even as federal agents were focused on seizing illegal imports of the synthetic opioid, show how much has changed since the federal government last carried out an execution nearly 20 years ago. Many pharmaceutical companies have since put tight controls on their distribution channels to stop their drugs being used in executions. As old supply chains vanished, many states, and the federal government in turn, have been forced to tinker with their lethal recipes. They have experimented with different drugs, in some cases leading to grisly “botched” executions in which the condemned prisoners have visibly suffered prolonged, excruciating deaths, viewed by some as a breach of the constitutional ban on “cruel and unusual” punishments. In 2017, Nebraska and Nevada announced they would use fentanyl, which is 100 times more powerful than morphine, in new multi-drug execution protocols. By 2018, the U.S. Justice Department was also examining the “use of fentanyl as part of a lethal injection protocol,” according to a three-page internal memorandum from March 2018 by the director of the department’s Bureau of Prisons. The Justice Department revealed the memo’s existence in an August court filing after a federal judge ordered it to produce a complete “administrative record” showing how it arrived at the new pentobarbital execution protocol announced in July. The full contents of the memo are not public. It is not known why the department decided to examine fentanyl, what supply channels were considered or why it ultimately rejected fentanyl as a protocol. The government’s court filing shows the only other named drug examined as the subject of a department memo was pentobarbital, the drug it now says it wants to use in December and January to kill five of the 61 prisoners awaiting execution on federal death row. Wyn Hornbuckle, a department spokesman, declined to share a copy of the memo or to answer questions about the government’s execution protocol. Mark Inch, who was the Bureau of Prisons’ director at the time, acknowledged in a brief telephone interview writing the memo. Inch, who abruptly resigned a couple months after writing the memo, declined to answer questions, in part because he said it would be in conflict with his current role running Florida’s Department of Corrections. Doctors can prescribe fentanyl for treating severe pain. In recent years, illegal fentanyl has become a common additive in bootleg pain pills and other street drugs, contributing to the tens of thousands of opioid overdose deaths in the country each year. Even tiny quantities can slow or stop a person’s breathing. Earlier this year, an Ohio lawmaker proposed using some of the illegal fentanyl seized from drug traffickers to execute condemned inmates. Death penalty researchers say that just because a drug is deadly does not mean it is always appropriate as an execution drug. “I don’t think it’d be a surprise that the government would be looking at alternative methods of carrying out lethal injection, and fentanyl has been in the news,” Robert Dunham, the director of the Washington-based non-profit group the Death Penalty Information Center, said in an interview. “But there is just something fundamentally wrong about using a drug implicated in illegal activities as your method of executing prisoners.”   In August 2018, Carey Dean Moore became the first person in the United States to be executed using a protocol that included fentanyl. Nebraska prison officials injected him with fentanyl and three other drugs. Moore took 23 minutes to die. Witnesses said that before succumbing, Moore breathed heavily and coughed and that his face turned red, then purple.


Beta-Propiolactone is in vaccines and is known to cause cancer, suspected gastrointestinal, liver, nerve and respiratory, skin and sense organ poison. It may be present in trace amounts of some vaccines. It is potentially carcinogenic, but only in much larger amounts than would be in a vaccine. The antibiotics gentamicin sulfate and polymyxin b are in vaccines and can cause allergic reactions ranging from mild to life-threatening. Traces of these antibiotics can end up in certain vaccines, but would only cause a reaction in someone severely allergic. Genetically modified yeast, animal, bacterial and viral DNA in vaccines can be incorporated into the recipient’s DNA causing unknown genetic mutations. Modified DNA can be used in the production of some vaccines, but is very unlikely to end up in the final product. Even if it did, there’s no evidence it can cause mutations. Glutaraldehyde is in vaccines and is poisonous if ingested and causes birth defects in animals. There are trace amounts in some vaccines from manufacturing, and not enough to cause harm. Formaldehyde is in vaccines and causes cancer in humans among other issues and is banned from vaccines in most European countries. It’s not banned in Europe. There are only trace amounts in certain vaccines and not enough to be carcinogenic. Latex rubber is in vaccines and causes life-threatening allergic reactions. Latex is used in the packaging of some vaccines, which could potentially cause harm if someone’s strongly allergic to it. Human and animal cells from sources like aborted foetuses are in vaccines and are linked to childhood leukaemia and diabetes. They may be used in certain vaccines’ production, but are unlikely to make it to the final product. Mercury (aka thimerosal or thiomersal) is in vaccines and can damage brain, gut, liver, bone marrow, nervous system and kidneys, is linked to autoimmune disorder, autism. Thiomersal isn’t in any UK vaccines any more. This is down to concern around a slightly different mercury-based chemical. MSG is in vaccines and is linked to birth defects, developmental delays, infertility and is banned in Europe. It’s not banned in Europe. It’s used in some vaccines to stabilise them. There’s no strong evidence it causes these problems in humans. Neomycin sulphate, an antibiotic, is in vaccines and can lead to epilepsy, brain damage and allergic reactions. Trace amounts of this antibiotic may end up in certain vaccines. If you are allergic to it could cause an allergic reaction. Phenol / phenoxyethanol is in vaccines and is used as antifreeze. It is toxic to all cells and can destroy the immune system. These chemicals have been used in vaccines as preservatives. They are not in antifreeze. Polysorbate 80 and 20 are in vaccines and cause cancer in animals and are linked to autoimmune issues and infertility. Tiny amounts of Polysorbate 80 is in a type of flu vaccine. There isn’t evidence ingesting it is linked to these issues in humans. Tri(n) butylphosphate is in vaccines and is potentially damaging to the kidneys and the nervous system. We can find no evidence of this being used in vaccines in the UK. Claim 1 of 14


Study shows therapy improves quality of life in people who have sleep apnea.

Explanation: This news release from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine describes a large retrospective study that shows that positive airway pressure (PAP) therapy improves quality of life in patients with obstructive sleep apnea. PAP therapy is often given via CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machines, and has been a standard treatment for sleep apnea for several decades. The release does a good job describing the study itself, and how the authors broke down patients into subgroups that compared age and socio-economic status. But the release also left much to be desired: it didn’t describe the limitations of retrospective studies or adequately discuss the harms or costs of these machines, which can be prohibitively expensive for some patients. Most importantly, the news release did not do a good job of establishing the novelty of this study. While there was a large sample size and various measures of quality of life, it is still unclear how this study is new since the benefits of CPAP are already well known. Obstructive sleep apnea is a common condition in the United States (and the world). It affects about 20 million adult Americans each year, and significantly decreases quality of life due to poor sleep. Sufferers of sleep apnea report daytime symptoms as well, which can include drowsiness, moodiness, headaches, and lack of energy. However sleep apnea is also a well-studied condition, and it is already known that there are several interventions, including use of a CPAP machine, that can help improve symptoms and quality of life. It would be more newsworthy if the researchers had learned something different or new about CPAP treatment or sleep apnea, instead of re-establishing what has already been known for years. The most interesting thing from this news release was that those in lower socio-economic subgroups seemed to benefit less from PAP therapy–perhaps this is a region worth further study.

American Academy of Sleep Medicine,positive airway pressure (PAP) therapy,Sleep apnea

Despite touting the benefits of CPAP, the news release made no mention of the costs of CPAP home machines. These machines aren’t cheap–a quick internet search shows that they can run anywhere from $500 to over $1,000, not including other necessary equipment such as face masks and cleaning supplies. While the National Sleep Foundation says that most insurance policies cover CPAP machines, it is likely that someone buying a machine will still have to pay a hefty out-of-pocket sum. This could prove to be an obstacle to many seeking treatment, especially people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. The news release was vague about how much patients benefited, and didn’t provide any numbers from the study itself to put the findings in context. While the release said that “results show that there were significant and clinically meaningful improvements,” for patients using CPAP, the reader has no idea what that ultimately means. It would have been helpful if the news release provided some numerical indicators that demonstrated exactly how much the intervention helped. While CPAP therapy is relatively safe, there are still common side effects that were not mentioned in the news release. According to the National Sleep Foundation, most CPAP users will experience some mild side effects including congestion, runny nose, or stomach bloating. Though the harms are only mildly irritating, it would have been helpful if they were included in the release. The release mentioned that there were over 2,000 people in the study, that it was conducted over a period of four years, and that scores on two different questionnaires were used to measure benefits. The study itself mentioned some additional limitations, including the fact that it was a retrospective study and there was no control arm. These limitations should have been included in the news release as well. No disease mongering in this news release. The news release did include a section at the bottom describing the funding sources for the study. However, it neglected to note that the first author has ties to two industry companies (Phillips Respironics and ResMed), both of which make money on the sale and upkeep of CPAP machines and supplies. This is an important financial conflict of interest to include. While CPAP is a widely used and effective treatment for sleep apnea, it is not the only solution. Other treatments include dental appliances, surgery, and nerve stimulation. The news release did not make any mentions of these alternate treatments. The news release made no mention of the availability of CPAP machines, even though they are easy to find. As mentioned above, however, their cost can often be prohibitive. It would have been helpful if the news release discussed low-cost options, especially since they mentioned that the intervention seemed to have less effect for lower socio-economic subgroups. This is the main problem with the news release: how is the fact that PAP helps sleep apnea news? CPAP machines were first used in the early 1970s, and since then there has been a large body of evidence that PAP is helpful for sleep apnea patients. In the study discussion, the authors include one sentence that attempts to establish the novelty of their research: “Our study differs from the existing clinical studies because it includes a robustly large number of patients and utilizes both sleep-related and global QoL instruments.” They seem to be saying that their study is novel on two accounts: the large sample size, and the fact that they use two different questionnaires as measurements. But is this enough to warrant a news release on a treatment that has already been studied extensively? Including this information would have helped readers to draw their own conclusions on this question. No unjustifiable or sensational language here.


Zinc will help your cold, at least a little

Explanation: It begins well, saying, “A new look at the medical evidence shows zinc supplements may take the edge off the common cold. But not a whole lot.” That’s a more realistic assessment of the evidence than the more enthusiastic beginning to the WebMD story on the same subject. At the same time, this story could have done a better job providing details from the review and quantifying the benefits in a transparent way. We also wish it had brought in some outside perspectives, which could have offered some important insights. But let’s not lose sight of the strong points:  for the second straight day, Reuters Health (and this same reporter) led with caution while others trumpeted findings. Note how the WebMD had an early quote, “This is great news.” And the NY Times’ first sentence said it “may be the next best thing” to a cure. To quote the title of an evidence-based health care column in the Times, “Really?”  Although most of us view the common cold as a mere nuisance, the infection can have serious clinical and economic impact. The common cold is responsible for a large number of lost work days, lost school days and physician visits. Over $400 Million is spent annually in the US for over the counter remedies. Unfortunately, the common cold is also responsible for significant number of prescriptions for antibiotics despite the fact that antibiotics do not work against viral infections. The common cold can also trigger ear infections, sinusitis and worsen lung disease. The Cochrane review of published studies assessing the value of a number of different zinc products as both preventives and for treatment provides a new look at a long standing question; Do zinc salts provide any benefit in the treatment or prevention of the common cold? Stories about such a sought after treatment should take an appropriately critical and cautious look at the evidence.

The story says that the supplements can be bought “for a few dollars,” which is more than the WebMD story noted. Even better, though, this story talked about the costs in work days missed and lost productivity from the common cold. The story provided fewer numbers than the WebMD story, and we wish it had presented some of the evidence in absolute terms. The story seems to want it both ways. While the story opening does provide the reader with some understanding of the uncertainty of the review results, the quotes from one of the study authors appear to provide an endorsement that is well beyond that in the study conclusions. For example, the story notes, “The bottom line: After seven days of treatment, those taking the supplements had less than half the chance of still being sick.” What is left unsaid is that the authors of the paper rated the evidence for that conclusion as low and “Further research is very likely to have an important impact on our confidence in the estimate of effect and is likely to change the estimate.” Far from the declarative statement in the story. The story didn’t quantify the potential harms, but did discuss the side effects. This story says, “Singh said the side effects of zinc lozenges, which can be bought for a few dollars in any drug store in the U.S., come down to bad taste and some cases of nausea.” The full listing in the article includes constipation, diarrhea, abdominal pain, dry mouth and oral irritation. Because the story downplayed the side effects in a story that is essentially encouraging long-term zinc use. The story did a better job than the WebMD story on the same topic of walking readers through the review. It says, for example, high up, “The new review is based on 13 trials with 966 participants who either took zinc or a dummy treatment at the beginning of their symptoms. Another two trials found that zinc helped stave off colds, but the quality of that research was low.The bottom line: After seven days of treatment, those taking the supplements had less than half the chance of still being sick.” The story also says, “Exactly how well zinc works is a matter of future research, and the one day estimate may well change, the researchers note. They add it is currently unclear what dose and particular formulation of the supplement will be most helpful.” The published article is 58 pages long, so it is not surprising that a story can’t do it all in reporting on the results. For example, the story suggests that 13 trials were included in the review. That is true but not all of the trials were included in the each analysis due to different reporting methods. People who took zinc preparations are said to have had symptoms that lasted about a day shorter than those who took a placebo, which is based on six of the trials. The paper notes a mean reduction of about one day. That is a subtle but big difference. The story also notes that people taking zinc products had less severe symptoms, which was based on five of the trials and not 13. A bit more attention to the detail would have provided readers with a better understanding of the review methods. Nonethless, we’ll give it the benefit of the doubt, as the overall tone of the story drove home the uncertainties:  “may take the edge off the common cold…but not a whole lot.” … “I think one can give it a try,” said the researcher who led the new work. “But giving zinc over a long period of time for prevention should be be done very carefully.”  All appropriate caveats. No disease-mongering. We appreciated that this story gave information about the financial and clinical impact of the common cold. Our posted criterion doesn’t allow us to give a satisfactory grade to a story that relies on just one source, even a source as smart as Dr. Meenu Singh, the author of this study. The story didn’t compare zinc to alternatives, which is a shame. People take many different drugs, supplements and home remedies to fight colds. We wish that even a few words had been given to the evidence for those treatments as well. We would have liked to have seen some comment on the best ways to protect yourself and your family from getting a cold besides zinc products. A few words about hand hygiene and keeping your hands away from your eyes, mouth and nose would have been helpful to the readers This story, unlike the WebMD story, made it clear exactly what the review looked at and where those supplements could be found. “Singh said the side effects of zinc lozenges, which can be bought for a few dollars in any drug store in the U.S., come down to bad taste and some cases of nausea. The researchers did not study nasal zinc remedies, however.In 2009, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warned Matrixx Initiatives to stop selling its widely used supplement Zicam after more than 130 users reportedly lost their sense of smell.” The story talked about how this review fits into the growing amount of research around zinc. The story didn’t rely solely or largely on a news release.


Diabetes drug may keep lung cancer at bay

Explanation: Weaker on costs, quality of the evidence, benefits, harms, and comparison to other approaches or other research. That’s quite a few holes in comparison with the competition on this one. It’s interesting to learn that an inexpensive generic drug could have a positive effect against lung cancer. But this story didn’t deliver sufficient detail or context for readers to be able to judge the current state of the research.

The story doesn’t mention the cost of metformin, which is relatively cheap as a generic, thus adding to the potential appeal of this approach. This should have been mentioned. Unsatisfactory because all risk reduction figures were in relative terms, not absolute. Read our primer on this. Why not tell us 40-50% fewer tumors THAN WHAT? 72% fewer tumors – compared TO WHAT? There was no discussion of harms. We don’t know what harms there might be in mice on metformin, but we shouldn’t have to wonder! After all, we weren’t the ones writing about "strong" benefits of metformin in mice! The story was really weak on this, only mentioning how "strong" the findings were. Meantime, in comparison, the HealthDay story advanced into a discussion of possible mechanisms of action, the fact that the mice studied had been genetically engineered to be susceptible to lung tumors, and the fact that a second study was reported in a very small number of humans. Big picture:  this story didn’t put "mouse research" in the headline or in the first sentence and then failed to discuss human research that DID exist in this specific area. By comparison the HealthDay story ended with the quote, "what’s proven in humans is totally another level." No overt disease mongering of disease and death from use of tobacco products. A hesitant satisfactory on this one only because it quoted a comment from an expert "who wrote a review on metformin research in the same journal." There was no evidence of any interview having been conducted, though. No meaningful comparison with other lung cancer prevention approaches and not even with parallel human research in this field – as the HealthDay story did in at least mentioning a small human study of metformin in colorectal cancer patients. The story says metformin "is already widely used in people." The story did mention some other past research on metformin and cancer risk. Not applicable because we can’t be sure of the extent to which the story may have been influenced by a news release. There’s no evidence of any independent interviewing, since quotes seem to come from published statements or from journal review comments.


Some Cubans choose dose of private medicine despite price.

Explanation: For a dollar, Cuban podiatrist Serafin Barca will spend a half hour cutting the corns off a senior citizen’s foot, or nearly an hour removing a stubborn wart.

Havana, Cuba, Health, Latin America, International News, AP Latino

The 80-year-old is among the last private medical workers in communist Cuba, which prides itself on its free, universal state health care and which has barred the creation of new private medical practices since 1963 — the year Barca graduated in his specialty after four years of study. Barca is busy from morning until night treating patients frustrated with the inefficiency of the state system. “The service is of higher quality,” Barca said. “If you get a patient and you don’t treat them well ... you don’t get them back.” Some Cubans believe that allowing more private practices would improve services and help ease the state’s burden, allowing it to concentrate on more complicated surgeries and treatments that require sophisticated technology. A growing number of Cubans in recent years have begun to complain about the quality of free medical services, which many say has been affected by doctors leaving on international health missions or moving to countries such as the U.S. in search of higher salaries and a better quality of life. Martha Garcia, a 72-year-old retiree, has been visiting Barca for her foot problems for more than a decade. “I could go to the Policlinico, but I don’t get the help I need when I’ve gone because they say they don’t have the necessary equipment,” she said of a free health clinic in Havana. She envisions private practices for optometrists, physiotherapists and others. “This would allow the state to take charge of more complex things,” she said. Cuba continued to allow private medical practices for the first few years after the 1959 revolution. But as the country veered toward socialism and the health system was nationalized, about half of Cuba’s doctors poured out of the country, leaving only about 5,000. The revolutionary government poured resources into health care, and there are now 70,000 doctors — many of whom serve on medical missions in other countries, which have become a significant source of income for the government. Only a handful of private practitioners remain because no new ones have been allowed in more than half a century. President Raul Castro has allowed the legal privatization of businesses ranging from cafeterias to masonries to hair salons, but professionals including doctors and engineers, lawyers and architects have not been given the same opportunity. For now, there are no signs state authorities will expand that liberalization to the medical field, considered strategic by the government. Officials have tried to raise awareness among Cubans about the value of its medical services, though. Posters at clinics across the island tell patients of the costs the government is paying: a consultation is $1, an X-ray nearly $4, an MRI $32 and a gallbladder surgery $36 — costs dramatically lower than in most nations due in part to the low salaries for medical workers, but still significant to Cubans, who on average make the equivalent of about $20 to $30 a month. Still, a few Cubans prefer paying for private treatment. Among them is Mayra Hernandez, a 55-year-old hotel worker who said getting treated by Barca is worth paying for the bus trip to his office and the fee he charges. “He’s the best podiatrist in Havana and all of Cuba,” she said, adding that she visited public clinics but was unable to get the treatment she needed. She said she’d been 10th in line at one when “the specialist came out and said, ‘I have five scalpels and that’s it.’” Barca said he will continue to welcome patients into his crowded office as his health permits. He works four seven-hour days a week. “I like my profession,” he said as he sat in his small office with worn seats and aging furniture that seemed frozen in time since the 1950s. “Everyone who had a private practice was allowed to work until they retired or died. I’ll be here until I die.”


The Chilean "privatization scheme" that Sharron Angle supports "has resulted in hidden fees, fewer benefits, and millions of people with no coverage.

Explanation: Patriot Majority PAC conjures up Chilean dictator in attack on Sharron Angle

National, Financial Regulation, Foreign Policy, Message Machine 2010, Social Security, Patriot Majority PAC,

It isn't often that U.S. campaigns venture into Latin American retirement policy, but the knock-down, drag-out battle for a Nevada Senate seat has done just that. It came up in an ad run by the Patriot Majority PAC, an obscure Washington-based group that appears to be spending big money on campaign advertising this year, primarily against Sharron Angle, the Republican who's challenging Senate Majority Harry Reid, D-Nev. The ad seizes on a comment made by Angle about Social Security privatization during an Aug. 12, 2010, interview with KLAS-TV. Here's the narration:  "How does Sharron Angle plan to phase out Social Security? (Video of Angle saying, "Chile has done this.") Chile? The country once led by Augusto Pinochet, the military dictator and human rights violator? Chile's privatization scheme has resulted in hidden fees, fewer benefits and millions of people with no coverage. (Angle: "Chile has done this.") Privatize? Phase out? Pinochet? (Angle: "Chile has done this.") Another day, and another bad idea from Sharron Angle. What's next?" We were somewhat caught off guard by the ad sponsor's effort to use Angle's pension-policy positions to link her to a "military dictator and human rights violator," complete with footage of goose-stepping Chilean soldiers on parade. But that connection, tenuous though it may be, didn't strike us as checkable in our conventional sense. Instead, we'll focus on whether the ad fairly describes the nuts and bolts of Chilean retirement security. Is the ad justified in saying that "Chile's privatization scheme has resulted in hidden fees, fewer benefits and millions of people with no coverage"? For many years, the Chilean system has been an inspiration to free-market advocates in the U.S. and elsewhere, so it's not surprising that Angle would have cited it. Here's some background on the system. Chile created its first Social Security-style programs in the 1920s, a decade or so before the United States did. But the government under Pinochet made a big change in 1981, transitioning all new workers -- as well as beneficiaries of the old, defined-benefit system who were willing to make the switch -- to a pension plan based on individual accounts run by private-sector investment managers. By now, almost all Chileans are enrolled in the post-1981 system. The program details have changed somewhat over the years, most recently due to a major round of changes in 2008. But the general outline has remained the same. Ten percent of workers' income is automatically deducted to fund their retirement, disability and survivor insurance, plus an additional charge for administrative costs. Employees can choose from among several government-approved private pension management companies, each of which offers five varieties of funds with varying degrees of risk. The funds and their approaches have been reviewed by a government regulator. Total assets in the system by the end of 2009 reached $107 billion in U.S dollars, or about 65 percent of Chile’s gross domestic product. Because the Chilean system has been a trendsetter, it has been studied extensively. Independent analyses suggest that over the long term, the level of support for retirees under Chile's system has been close or better than that in similar countries. But the Chilean system has also faced its share of criticism. Some of that criticism echoes what the ad says. Here's a closer look at the three issues raised in the ad. • Hidden fees. High fees have been a longstanding concern about the Chilean system. Due to lack of competition among private-sector money managers that participate in the system, these management companies' profits have been much larger than profit margins in other sectors of Chile’s financial services industry, wrote U.S. Social Security Administration researcher Barbara E. Kritzer in one paper. Over a full career contributing to the system, workers pay around 15 percent for administration, according to the International Organization of Pension Supervisors. This is in the middle of six Latin American countries and below five Eastern European countries with a Chilean-style individual accounts system. Several experts said that a series of government reforms in 2008 helped lower fees. In our reporting, we found that even supporters of the system acknowledged that fees have been a problem. But are they "hidden," as the ad says? None of the handful of experts we spoke to said so. In fact, fees are more obvious to contributors in Chile than in other countries because they are levied on top of the mandatory contribution to private pensions. So while the ad is on track in its criticism of fees, it is wrong to say they are hidden. • Fewer benefits. Most studies have shown a long-term rate of return in the Chilean system of roughly 10 percent, which is high by international standards. But even if those rates of return are optimistic going forward -- whether because they were boosted by a period of unusually strong returns or because of insufficient participation by Chilean workers in the plan -- experts we spoke to agreed that for Chileans, the current system is preferable to the pre-1981 system. In fact, Pinochet's system remained in place after the transition to democracy and was retained by the socialist administration of Michelle Bachelet. (Bachelet lost power in March 2010.) Mauricio Soto of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College has written that the old pension system was "in crisis" prior to 1981 -- paying more in benefits than it was receiving in contributions, with a projected actuarial imbalance greater than the country's gross domestic product. In addition, the patchwork system was "poorly administered and inefficient" and led to discrepancies in which "white-collar workers could comfortably retire in their 40s, while blue-collar workers had to wait until their 60s to qualify for minimum retirement benefits." There's no question that the current investor-based pension system carries risks, being subject to markets that can go up or down. But Chile's old system simply wasn't sustainable. "It was unfunded and essentially a fantasy," said Michael Tanner, a senior fellow with the libertarian Cato Institute, a longtime champion of the Chilean system. So to suggest, as the ad does, that switching to a private system in 1981 resulted in "fewer benefits" is at best misleading. • Millions of people with no coverage. This charge is true -- but misleading for a couple reasons. Though the proportion of Chileans participating in the system has varied over time, the percentage has hovered around two-thirds, a rate similar to under the pre-1981 system. This is clearly less than the nearly universal coverage provided by the U.S. Social Security system. But Chile is also not nearly as rich as the U.S.  Several experts we spoke to agreed that the coverage gaps have at least as much to do with the nature of the Chilean economy as with the design of the country's retirement system. Soto notes that low-income Chileans working in the underground economy account for about 30 percent of the workforce. These workers are typically not covered by the pension system unless they have previously worked in a legitimate business. Meanwhile, participation by the self-employed was for many years voluntary (and very low), though mandatory participation is being phased in by the 2008 reforms. Even among workers in traditional jobs, participation rates have usually topped out around 80 percent, with the percentage taking part at any given time even lower, since workers do not always keep up their contributions due to unemployment or a failure to comply with the law. This is a serious issue. As Kritzer notes, "only a small portion" of workers with less-than-perfect participation histories "would have enough contributions to qualify for the guaranteed minimum benefit at retirement." The 2008 reform addressed coverage concerns by introducing a universal pension paid to all Chileans over the age of 65 regardless of their contribution history. In addition, workers with small pensions from their individual accounts will have them topped up by the government. While we think it's fair for the ad to note that the Chilean system has holes, it's important to note that the pre-1981 system had holes too -- and that the nature of the Chilean economy plays at least as big a role in causing this problem as the retirement system itself. So where does this leave us? The ad demonizes the Chilean system in ways that we think are exaggerated. Fees are a problem, but they are not hidden. Rather than offering smaller benefits, the system has provided strong returns and is almost certainly sounder today than prior to 1981. And the coverage gaps that exist now are not unique to the privatized system and have a lot to do with specific factors at play in Chile. The ad does have a point that the Chilean system, at least if it's implemented without major differences, would likely be seen by most Americans as inferior to Social Security. The size of the coverage gaps in Chile's system, while understandable given Chile's economic situation, would be unacceptable to many, if not most, Americans. But this reasonable point is undercut by the ad's overheated rhetoric ("human rights violator"), imagery (the goose-stepping soldiers) and exaggerations about the substance of the Chilean plan.


In Africa, a child dies every minute because of (malaria).

Global News Service, Foreign Policy, Public Health, Tim Ziemer,

A grim statistic is circulating this World Malaria Day. USAID’s Tina Dooley-Jones, deputy mission director in Kenya, marked the occasion in Nairobi saying that "globally, malaria kills a child every two minutes." Dooley-Jones is far from the only one with that message. It plays large among malaria advocacy groups like Nothing But Nets. So it was curious to see a post in January on Medium from the head of the President’s Malaria Initiative, rear admiral Tim Ziemer, with the statement that "in Africa, a child dies every minute because of the disease." The initiative is one of the government’s largest global health efforts. It began under President George W. Bush and has been carried forward by President Barack Obama. Malaria’s toll among African children is a touchstone for many health activists, but the numbers can vary. Our colleagues at Africa Check spotted a range of statements. One organization claimed a child died every 30 seconds, another said once every two minutes, and in between was Ziemer’s figure. In this fact-check, we affirm that the correct number is closer to once every two minutes. USAID spokesman Ryan Essman told us that until fairly recently, his agency would talk about a death every one to two minutes, but now uses the two-minute time frame. "Admiral Ziemer has been working with malaria for a decade," Essman said. "He had it when he was child. Usually he uses the right number, but he might have slipped in the previous one." As a humanitarian matter, the exact death toll makes little difference. This table from the Kaiser Family Foundation, using World Health Organization data, clearly shows that Africa bears the greatest burden of malaria. WHO Region Number of countries with ongoing transmission Estimated cases (1,000s) Percentage Estimated deaths (in 1,000s) Percentage Global total 96 214,000 100% 438 100% Africa 44 188,000 88% 395 90% Americas 21 660 <1% 0.5 <1% Eastern Mediterranean 8 3,900 2% 6.8 2% Europe 3 0 0% 0 0% South-East Asia 10 20,000 9% 32 7% Western Pacific 10 1,500 <1% 3.2 <1%  Africa wrestles with 90 percent of all deaths by the disease worldwide, and almost as large a percentage of active cases. Malaria is particularly lethal for pregnant women and their babies. The federal government estimates that it kills about 10,000 expectant mothers each year in Sub-Saharan Africa. Another 200,000 children will die prematurely from complications due to their mothers having bouts of malaria during pregnancy. Malaria’s death toll Our colleagues at Africa Check turned to the World Health Organization data for 2015. With huge gaps in the health care systems in many African nations, all experts agree that a precise count of malaria death is impossible. The WHO provides a range of estimates. Number of malaria deaths in children under 5 in Africa Middle estimate 292,000 Lowest estimate 212,000 Highest estimate 384,000  From that, the middle estimate shows one child dies every 1 minute 48 seconds, or close to once every two minutes. Middle estimate 1 min 48 sec Lowest estimate 2 min 28 sec Highest estimate 1 min 22 sec  The U.S. government spent about $860 million this fiscal year to fight malaria. The money went for a drug that can help pregnant women and their children, but many dollars also went to insecticide-treated nets and indoor spraying to prevent people from catching the disease in the first place. Obama seeks to raise the total by about another $70 million in the last budget of his administration. There is a strong global push to eradicate malaria, and gains have been made. In the past decade and a half, the rate of new cases has fallen by about a third in Sub-Saharan Africa. Going forward, many hurdles remain. Mosquitoes can become resistant to the most common insecticides, weak health care systems in many countries make it difficult to sustain antimalaria programs, and counterfeit drugs can be as fatal as the disease itself. Our ruling Ziemer wrote that malaria kills a child in Africa each minute. His staff at USAID said that figure is off. A better estimate is that a child dies every 1 minute 48 seconds. But even that figure comes with a measure of uncertainty. The actual death rate could be higher or lower. By any estimate, malaria remains a serious threat to children in Africa.