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Coconut oil is not an antibiotic and it cannot prevent dengue fever

AFP Philippines Published on Monday 15 July 2019 at 11:00
Claims that coconut oil is an antibiotic and can prevent dengue fever have circulated for years in widely-shared social media posts in countries including the Philippines and India. The claims are false; experts including the World Health Organization have told AFP that coconut oil is not an antibiotic and can neither prevent nor cure dengue fever.
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This photo of rosaries confiscated at the US-Mexico border was taken in 2015

Marisha Goldhamer Published on Friday 12 July 2019 at 21:48
A photo of rosaries confiscated from migrants and discarded by the US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) continues to be shared in posts on social media in June 2019, almost four years after it was captured. Photographer Tom Kiefer told AFP he took the image in July 2015 after having worked as a janitor at a CBP processing facility in Arizona until 2014. Current CBP policy states migrants’ personal property should be returned to them after they leave a CBP facility. But representatives from an NGO working at the US southern border told AFP that detained migrants continue to report some personal items confiscated by the authorities have never been returned to them. 
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AFP / Issouf Sanogo

Protesters set fire to Burkina Faso’s parliament in 2014. Why is it trending in Kenya now?

AFP Kenya, Mary Kulundu Published on Friday 12 July 2019 at 13:36
“Burkina Faso” was among the top ten trending topics in Kenya on Thursday morning, after an article headlined: 'Burkina Faso Parliament set ablaze' was retrieved from the archives and began circulating again online. Some 1,300 tweets were posted from Kenya about Burkina Faso on Thursday, some of them congratulating protesters in the west African country for setting the building on fire. Looking at the tweets as well as Facebook posts, it’s clear that some online users thought the fire had just happened. In fact, the parliament in Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou was actually torched back in 2014. So why did it start trending again, on the other side of Africa, in July 2019?
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AFP / Noel Celis

No, being unable to find a sexual partner will not make you ‘disabled’ under new World Health Organization guidelines

AFP Kenya, Mary Kulundu Published on Friday 12 July 2019 at 13:22
Various articles -- most recently, in Kenya -- have claimed that the World Health Organization (WHO) is planning to redefine infertility to include people who are unable to find a partner. Reports that the WHO was widening its definition of infertility have been in circulation since 2016. But the UN agency refuted the reports when they first emerged in 2016, and WHO officials told AFP there are no plans to change the definition.
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A Pakistani fan was not killed in clashes with Afghan fans at the Cricket World Cup

AFP Pakistan, Adeng Mayik Published on Friday 12 July 2019 at 10:30
A photograph of a dead man in a body bag has been shared thousands of times in Facebook posts and WhatsApp messages that claim it shows a Pakistani killed in clashes with Afghans at the Cricket World Cup 2019 in Headingley, England. The claim is false; the photo actually shows a car accident involving illegal migrants in Turkey; West Yorkshire police said they had no reports of fatalities after the clashes in Headingley.
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