UN secretary-general announcement that COVID-19 vaccine trials will begin in Africa.
The post, written in Kiswahili, adds that Africans who voluntarily take part in the vaccine trials will be paid a lot of money., The World Health Organization (WHO) condemned as ‘racist’ remarks by two French doctors, who suggested that Africa should be used as a testing ground for vaccines., “We condemn this in the strongest terms possible, and we assure you that this will not happen,” WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said. “Africa can’t and won’t be a testing ground for any vaccine.”, There’s no credible media publication that has reported the claims that have been attributed to the United Nations secretary-general. Neither has any of that information been posted on the UN website, where updates are regularly published., According to the WHO, there is currently no treatment specifically approved to prevent or treat COVID-19., The suggestion for human testing of the vaccine in Africa arose during a TV debate. One of the scientists later apologized after the remarks caused outrage on social media., PesaCheck has looked into the claim that Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, has announced that Africa will be the first COVID-19 vaccine testing ground and finds it to be FALSE., This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms., By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organizations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds., Have you spotted what you think is fake news or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content., This fact-check was written by PesaCheck Fact-Checker Najma Juma, and edited by PesaCheck News Editor Enock Nyariki., PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water/sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org., PesaCheck is a joint initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovate African fund, with additional funding support from the International Budget Partnership (Kenya) and Twaweza, in partnership with a coalition of local media organizations, and the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ)., Written by, Written by
FALSE: UN secretary-general has not announced that COVID-19 vaccine trials will begin in Africa