Bill Gates and Vaccine Conspiracy

In his most recent tweet, Bill Gates has praised India's efforts for vaccine development sharing the video of the conference at the National Metrology Conclave presided by the Prime Minsiter Narendra Modi:

However, there have been a surrounding controversy as to whether this serves as a bigger agenda of "depopulation", a conspiracy theory which has been propagated by anti-vaccers.

"There are myriad conspiracies surrounding Bill Gates," said Rory Smith, from fact-checkers First Draft News.

"He is this kind of voodoo doll that all these communities are pricking with their own conspiracies. And it is unsurprising he has become the voodoo doll - because he has always been the face of public health."
Theories falsely linking Bill Gates to the coronavirus were mentioned 1.2 million times on television or social media between February and April, according to a study by The New York Times and Zignal Labs.

Much of the content is posted to public Facebook groups, from where it is shared millions of times. First Draft News has also found that Chinese viral video site TikTok is becoming a new home for such conspiracies.

However, this fact has been unverified and qualifies as false news:

Some of the outlandish claims include that:

⦁    They claim that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has tested vaccines on children in Africa and India, leading to thousands of deaths and irreversible injuries. One post even suggested he is facing trial in India

⦁    He is accused of rolling out a tetanus vaccine in Kenya that includes abortion drugs

⦁    A video on the website of The New American Magazine's Facebook page continues with the theme of mass depopulation via vaccines and abortion, and also links Mr Gates to China's Communist Party. It was shared 6,500 times and viewed 200,000 times

⦁    Meanwhile a video accusing Gates of wanting to microchip people has garnered nearly two million views on YouTube

"Conspiracy theories are about accusing powerful people of doing terrible things," he told the BBC. "The theories are basically the same, just the names change.
"Before Bill Gates, it was George Soros and the Koch brothers and the Rothchilds and the Rockefellers."

Bill and Melinda Gates have stated that these claims are "laughable". 

They further went ahead to state "It is troubling that there is so much craziness. When we develop the vaccine we will want 80 percent of the population to take it and if they have heard it is a plot and we don't have people willing to take the vaccine that will let the disease continue to kill people."

"I'm kind of surprised some of it is focused on me. We are just giving money away, we write the cheque.. and yes we do think about let's protect children against disease but it is nothing to do with chips and that type of stuff. You almost have to laugh sometimes."

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a merging of the William H. Gates Foundation and the Gates Learning Foundation, is an American private foundation founded by Bill and Melinda Gates. They have been involved in a lot of philontrophy work worlwide including India. Such conspiracy theories are bound to take place and often rebuted by fact checking organisations. 

A lot of conspiracy theories have come up during the COVID-19 times and checkbrand team urges all its readers to stay away from false claims and abide by the govcernment directives.
 

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