Crédito: fuente
The town halls took place in lieu of the second presidential debate, which was called off after Trump refused to participate in a remote debate proposed by the Commission on Presidential Debates following his positive coronavirus diagnosis.
CNN fact-checked both events. Check back here for updates.
NBC anchor Savannah Guthrie, who was moderating the Trump town hall, asked about the QAnon-affiliated conspiracy theory Trump had retweeted earlier this week claiming Osama bin Laden was still alive and that the man killed in the raid was a body double. Trump defended his actions, saying, «That was a retweet. That was an opinion of somebody, and that was a retweet. I’ll put it out there. People can decide for themselves. I don’t take a position.»
Facts First: This is a baseless claim with no evidence to back it up. The facts around the killing of bin Laden are not a debatable opinion.
In the early morning hours of May 2, 2011, al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed by US Special Forces during a raid on his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. A DNA test was conducted, confirming it was bin Laden. He was buried at sea.
— Tara Subramaniam
Trump: 85% of people who wear masks get the coronavirus
Trump made a dramatic claim about Covid-19 during Thursday night’s town hall.
«Just the other day, they came out with a statement that 85% of the people that wear masks catch it,» Trump said.
It was a repeat of a similar claim he had made two times earlier in the day, citing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as the source for that number.
Rather, the study looked at the behavior of 154 symptomatic people who had tested positive for the coronavirus in July around the country and 160 people who reported symptoms but tested negative in July.
The study found that, of those 154 people, 85% said they had worn a mask either «always» or «often» over the 14 days prior to the onset of their illness. That’s where the 85% figure comes from.
Of the 160 people in the study who had tested negative, however, 88.7% said they had worn a mask either «always» or «often.» So there’s really no difference between people who wore masks and those who didn’t.
And that’s not even the point here.
Trump was suggesting that the CDC found that 85% of all people who wear masks get the coronavirus. But the CDC was just looking at the behavior of these 314 symptomatic people who sought out testing at 11 particular sites around the country in July.
Here’s how one of the co-authors, Christopher Lindsell, co-Director of the Health Data Science Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, described the study’s data on masks.
«The data suggest that among a group of patients who are already showing symptoms that prompted them to get testing for the virus, there was no statistical evidence of a difference in mask wearing behavior between those who tested positive and those who tested negative,» Lindsell said in an email. «This is very different from the question of whether wearing masks prevents you becoming infected with the virus, and it is also different to the question of how many or what percentage of people who wear masks contract the virus. The study was not designed to answer these questions.»
— Daniel Dale
Biden: Trump said injecting bleach will combat coronavirus
Biden claimed that Trump said injecting bleach could help combat the virus.
«President Trump says things like…crazy stuff he’s walking away from now, ‘inject bleach in your arm and that’s going to work,'» Biden said. «I’m being a bit — I’m not being facetious though; he actually said these things.»
Facts First: This is misleading. Biden was recalling a moment from a Trump briefing that attracted broad derision. Biden, however, overstated some of the specifics.
During an April 23 press briefing, which included a discussion of tests that appeared to show disinfectants like bleach and isopropyl alcohol quickly killed the coronavirus on surfaces in lab studies, Trump expressed interest in exploring the possibility of «injection inside or almost a cleaning» with disinfectants. Here’s what he said:
«(T)hen I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning, because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it’d be interesting to check that, so that you’re going to have to use medical doctors with, but it sounds interesting to me.»
— Holmes Lybrand
Trump: US deaths from Covid will exceed 2 million
Trump claimed the US was «expected to lose 2,200,000 people and maybe more than that» from the coronavirus.
Facts First: This is misleading.
In other words, that would be the loss of lives if no action were taken at all to mitigate it.
The report did not analyze what would happen if just the federal government took no action against the virus but rather what would occur if there were absolutely no «control measures or spontaneous changes in individual behaviour.»
— Holmes Lybrand and Tara Subramaniam
Biden: Covid vaccines haven’t been tested on kids
Answering a question about vaccines, Biden talked about the coronavirus’ impact on children.
«Children are getting the virus, not with as serious consequences, but we haven’t, there’s been no studies done yet on vaccines for children,» he said.
Facts first: Biden is correct about research in the US, though a leading drugmaker just this week revealed plans to include children in its vaccine research.
–Tami Luhby
This story has been updated.
