2018 report of two deaths in Sao Paulo after being vaccinated against the virus yellow fever Shared out of context on social media in September 2024.

According to the posts, which have been viewed thousands of times, the article will be updated and will note that the press only reported on the side effects of vaccinations after Jair Bolsonaro was no longer president. But the report was broadcast almost a year ago at Bolsonaro’s inauguration and the version circulating online was doctored to include a banner stating that “vaccines kill.”

“Now that Bolsonaro is no longer president, the vaccine kills… and Globo is the one saying it! I find it interesting for these bastard journalists!!!”, read a comment on posts on Facebook and Instagram, on threads on Telegram and on Kwai.

This claim was shared alongside a video in which journalist Cesar Trali says: “Guys, it is important to remember: the vaccine has contraindications, it has health risks. The municipal health minister here in São Paulo, Wilson Bollara, recently confirmed and told me over the phone that two people have already died here in São Paulo after taking the vaccine: a man and a woman.”

The recording reads: “Vaccines (Forbidden Truth).” At the bottom of the video, the words, presumably presented as a description of the report, can also be seen: “Vaccines kill” and “Two people died after taking the vaccine here in the capital.”

In one of the excerpts of the recording, the logo of the program “SP 1” broadcast by Rede Globo appears.

A Google search for the keywords showed that the viral video was part of a report the channel aired on January 19, 2018.

The Ministry of Health, together with the states of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Bahia, began a yellow fever vaccination campaign in an attempt to prevent an outbreak of the disease that had occurred the previous year.

At that time, Michel Temer (MDB) was the president of Brazil. Therefore, the recognition of the side effects of vaccinations had already been reported before the Bolsonaro government.

Rate Report

Furthermore, at no point in the report did the journalist mention that “vaccines kill,” as widely circulated posts suggest.

When you watch the full article, you can see that the journalist is reporting on the deaths reported after vaccination, but also warns that “only those who travel or live in an at-risk area should take this yellow fever vaccine.” This excerpt from the viral content has been removed and the explanation about the immunizer the journalist was referring to is missing.

A comparison between the viral sequence and the original video also allows us to notice that the descriptive title of the report has been manipulated: the words “yellow fever” have been replaced with “vaccines kill”:

In March 2018, researchers from the Institute of Biomedical Sciences (ICB) and the University of São Paulo School of Medicine (USP) ruled out that one of the deaths investigated at the time had been caused by an adverse reaction to the yellow fever vaccine. The researchers found that the patient had been infected with the virus days before being vaccinated and died before the protection had time to take effect.

On February 22, 2018, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) highlighted in its bulletin that “yellow fever vaccine is rarely associated with serious events” and that the most common reactions include headache and body aches.

According to the product leaflet, published by the same organization, “very rare events” include hypersensitivity reactions, anaphylactic reactions, neurological diseases, and viscerotropic diseases — with “a greater risk of such serious events in the elderly.”

References

SP1 Report published in 2018

Fiocruz Newsletter