CheckMate is a weekly newsletter from RMIT FactLab which recaps the latest in the world of fact checking and misinformation, drawing on the work of FactLab and its sister organisation, RMIT ABC Fact Check.
You can read the latest edition below, and subscribe to have the next newsletter delivered straight to your inbox.
CheckMate: April 29, 2022
In this week's CheckMate, we interrogate claims made by AFL pundits on The Sunday Footy Show (and shared widely among vaccine sceptics) about supposed COVID-19 vaccine side effects.
We also examine election funding rules, and set the record straight on the impact of the war in Ukraine on Australian fuel prices.
Former AFL stars wrongly suggest heart issues going 'through the roof' due to vaccines
Social media lit up after high-profile AFL pundits, including former player Matthew Lloyd, raised the possibility that COVID-19 jabs had fuelled a rise in heart conditions and Bell's palsy, with vaccine sceptics continuing to share quotes and clips of the exchange.
On April 10, panelists on Nine's AFL Sunday Footy Show discussed the mid-match benching of Port Adelaide player and Brownlow medallist Ollie Wines due to dizziness and nausea that was later attributed to a heart arrhythmia.
That conversation quickly turned to potential vaccine side effects, with commentator Nathan Brown suggesting there was "a lot of this going on in world sport at the moment" following COVID-19 "booster shots".
"That's obviously the word going round," he added, before host Tony Jones observed that there was also "a bit of [Bell's palsy] going round".
"Exactly," said Lloyd. "Heart issues and Bell's palsy has gone through the roof since the boosters and COVID issues."
But there is no evidence to suggest such a large increase in arrythmias related to the jab.
Lloyd has since walked back his comments, but that hasn't stopped them appearing in at least one global list of "athlete cardiac arrests [and] serious issues", popular among vaccine sceptics and debunked by FactCheck.org for including people who had, for example, suffered from medical issues that had nothing to do with vaccines.
CheckMate has in the past tackled similarly unfounded claims that heart conditions were increasing among athletes, finding they were not supported by data out of projects in the US and Australia that specifically tracked these issues, nor by FIFA's Sudden Death Registry.
Heart problems such as arrhythmia and sudden cardiac arrest are not uncommon among athletes, and there have been several examples of AFL footballers collapsing on field or suffering symptoms well before the advent of COVID-19.
In an email to CheckMate, Andre La Gerche, the head of sports cardiology with the Baker Institute, said there remained "no evidence of an increase in arrhythmias".
And although the sheer volume of vaccinated people now means that cardiac conditions will be more likely in those who have been immunised, he said there was "nothing to support causation or even a temporal association between COVID-19 vaccines and recent cases of arrhythmia among high-profile Australian sportspeople.
The same goes in the case of Ollie Wines, who confirmed after the episode aired that his heart arrhythmia was not connected to his vaccination.
It's worth noting that myocarditis and pericarditis, or inflammation of the heart muscle, is a known side-effect of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines.
However, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), which regulates prescription medicines and vaccines, describes such cases as "very rare" and "often mild", with its April 28 vaccine safety report documenting 1-2 cases in every 100,000 people who received a Moderna or Pfizer jab.
Nick Wood, an associate professor with the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance (NCIRS), told CheckMate that "a rare proportion" of vaccinations would lead to cases of myocarditis, of which some would present with arrhythmias, "but the thing on the video about it going through the roof is rubbish".
Dr Wood said there had been reports of Bell's palsy submitted by individuals or their GPs in the weeks following vaccination, and that it was likely there would be some cases where no other cause was found.
"But that does not necessarily mean there's an increase in the total number, and it's not a causal link for all of them," he said, adding that the NCIRS was investigating cases to rule out other causes.
A spokesman for the TGA told CheckMate that "acute facial paralysis including Bell's palsy is a known but very rare side effect" of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that has been "reported in fewer than 1 in 1000 patients in clinical trials".
"Bell's Palsy occurs spontaneously in the community, at a yearly rate between 13 and 53 cases per 100,000 people."
AAP Fact Check summarised the available research on this in August 2021, finding a handful of international studies had suggested the possibility of a slightly elevated risk among people who had received mRNA vaccines, although an expert noted that the "big safety surveillance systems in the US have not detected a signal".
The cause of Bell's palsy is not known, though it may be linked to a viral infection — including COVID-19 — and can be triggered by things like stress, trauma and minor illness. By some estimates, 1 in 60 people will experience the condition in their lifetime.
Is your vote really worth $2.90?
A claim from Turning Point Australia alleging that candidates standing in the federal election will receive $2.90 for each first preference vote is missing context, RMIT FactLab has found.
Turning Point Australia appears to be a local offshoot of a US group focused on promoting conservative values in schools and colleges.
However, contrary to its claim, which was posted on Facebook, only candidates who receive more than 4 per cent of the total number of formal first preference votes, and provide evidence of their "electoral expenditure", are eligible for funding from the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC).
According to the AEC, electoral expenditure is defined broadly as that which is "incurred for the dominant purpose of creating or communicating electoral matter" and may include "broadcasting, advertising and publishing expenses related to the election".
The amount of funding available, and who is entitled to payment, is complex.
According to section 292G of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, "Election funding may be payable in relation to registered political parties, candidates and groups under this Division. The election funding is payable in relation to any candidate who received at least 4 per cent of the total formal first preference votes cast in the election."
For example, Labor, the Liberal National Party of Queensland, the Greens and Pauline Hanson's One Nation all received more than 4 per cent of first preference votes in the Queensland electorate of Dickson at the last federal election, and therefore were all eligible for election funding.
Once it is determined that a candidate has reached the 4 per cent threshold, the AEC automatically provides the candidate with a CPI-indexed payment of $10,000.
The $2.90 per vote figure mentioned in Turning Point Australia's Facebook post only becomes relevant when a candidate claims more than the $10,000.
The AEC multiplies the $2.90 figure by the number of first preference votes received by the candidate to determine their "election funding entitlement".
However, the candidate is only paid the lesser of this entitlement or their "demonstrated electoral expenditure".
Importantly, candidates must lodge a claim with the AEC that provides evidence of their electoral expenditure to actually receive a payment.
Putin did not invade Ukraine to stop child trafficking
Misinformation peddlers have plagiarised a popular QAnon conspiracy theory to claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in a bid to stop child trafficking.
FactLab found this week there was no evidence to suggest Mr Putin had claimed that he wanted to "repatriate all the kids", as alleged in an article published by Real Raw News and shared on Facebook.
Rather, Mr Putin's stated reasons for the invasion were to "denazify" Ukraine, prevent the eastward expansion of NATO and protect Russia from external threats (although, as fact checkers have previously explained, many of Mr Putin's statements about the invasion amount to propaganda).
According to experts, narratives about saving children had long been pushed by QAnon to recruit new members.
"The narrative of the fake story and the other posts going around is more or less the same as what Q[Anon] believers have been pushing since the invasion started," author and conspiracy theory researcher Mike Rothschild told FactLab.
"Linking Putin with the effort to end child trafficking is a blatant dog whistle to QAnon and its believers. It shows that whoever is coming up with the fake stories for Real Raw News knows their audience, and what these people respond to."
The war is driving fuel prices up, despite claims to the contrary
Posts shared across Facebook purporting to compare the cost of a barrel of oil between 2008 and 2022 are claiming that "the war in Ukraine is not the reason" for the current bowser shock in Australia.
FactLab this week found such claims to be false: the retail price of petrol in Australia largely reflects the international cost of crude oil, which rose sharply on Russia's invasion of its neighbour.
Russia is a major exporter of crude oil. Its invasion — and the resulting economic sanctions — have inflated the international benchmark price, with flow-on effects for Australia's domestic market.
According to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the cost of fuel — adjusted for inflation — hit an eight-year high in late February following Russia's invasion on February 24.
And while the latest ACCC data is yet to be made public, prices continued to rise throughout March.
CoronaCheck
No, Bill Gates does not plan to depopulate the world via vaccination
Microsoft founder and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates' reputation as the pandemic's chief villain among COVID-19 conspiracists shows no signs of abating, with posts on Facebook suggesting he wants to "depopulate" the world "through forced vaccination".
According to one post, an article had been "scrubbed" from the internet in which Mr Gates was quoted as saying: "The world today has 6.8 billion people. That's headed up to about 9 billion. Now, if we do a really great job on new vaccines, healthcare, reproductive health services, we lower that by perhaps 10 or 15 per cent."
The posts play into an ongoing conspiracy theory which alleges that Mr Gates and the COVID-19 pandemic are part of a deep state plan to install a totalitarian new world order.
However, as FactLab found, while the quote was accurately attributed to Mr Gates, it was not said in support of depopulating the world through forced vaccinations, while a newspaper article citing the quote could be readily found online.
In 2010, Mr Gates gave a TED Talk titled "Innovating to zero!" in which he discussed the adverse effects of climate change and ways to reduce global carbon emissions.
During the talk, he advocated for better healthcare to curb the world's population increase, given its contribution to rising CO2 emissions. He made the statement quoted in the Facebook posts during this presentation, but he did not call for reducing the world's existing population.
Mr Gates has continued to advocate for better healthcare and vaccine distribution to reduce child mortality rates, repeatedly pointing to data that suggests lower mortality rates could lead to lower birth rates.
Has the government taxed, borrowed and spent more than Labor?
As the election campaign swings into gear, a focus of each of the major political parties has been their opponent's economic track record.
While the Liberals have claimed Labor cannot be trusted to run the economy, Shadow Treasurer Jim Chalmers said in a tweet published on April 26 that voters couldn't believe a word Prime Minister Scott Morrison said about the economy.
He went on to claim: "This Liberal National government has taxed more, borrowed more and spent more than the last Labor government — but delivered less."
RMIT ABC Fact Check this week found that claim to be correct.
Figures on tax, debt and spending as a proportion of GDP have been higher, on average, under the Coalition government since 2013 than under its Labor predecessor.
However, it's important to note, according to Chris Richardson of Deloitte Access Economics, that these figures aren't especially useful for assessing which party is the better economic manager.
Edited by Ellen McCutchan and David Campbell, with thanks to Liam McNally.
Got a fact that needs checking? Tweet us @ABCFactCheck or send us an email at factcheck@rmit.edu.au
Editor's note (June 6, 2022): This CheckMate was amended to clarify that there is no evidence to suggest a large increase in heart arrythmias related to COVID-19 vaccinations, and to acknowledge the known link between COVID-19 mRNA vaccines and the heart conditions myocarditis and pericarditis, cases of which experts and the national medicines regulator continue to advise are rare and usually mild.
