Lighthouse Journalism came across a post being circulated widely on various social media platforms. The post claimed that the director general of World Health Organisation, Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus is not vaccinated against Covid-19. The claim was accompanied by a video, which suggested that Dr Tedros was not vaccinated against Covid.
We found in our investigation that the viral claim is false. WHO chief is vaccinated against Covid-19.
Claim:
Twitter user Antonio Tweets shared the viral claim on his profile.
Check the archive version of the post.
Other users too are sharing the viral claim.
Investigation:
We started our investigation by doing a Google search.
We found an article published on the website of Associated Press.
The article also mentioned that the clip is from a documentary that shows Dr Ghedreyesus championing Covid-19 vaccines saying, at one point that he had waited for better global vaccine equity before receiving his own shot.
We found the link to this documentary too in the same article.
Later we did a keyword search on Twitter and found a post on the verified Twitter handle of the WHO chief where he was getting his Covid shot.
The picture was posted on May 13, 2021.
We also found an article on science.org.
The interview was titled: ‘I’m still feeling that we’re failing’: Exasperated WHO leader speaks out about vaccine inequity
The article was posted on 18 June 2021. In the last question, the interviewer asks Dr Tedros, ‘How did it feel once you got vaccinated?’ To which he responds, ‘I’m still feeling that we’re failing. I was having my shot with disappointment.’
We also connected with the media team of WHO, they confirmed that the viral claim is false.
Conclusion: Viral claim stating WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus is not vaccinated against Covid-19 is false. WHO chief is vaccinated against Covid and had shared his pictures while taking Covid vaccine.
