COVID-19 Didn't Cause More Fatalities Than Wars
The Claim
COVID-19 has caused more causalties than WWI; the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan-US wars; and 9/11.
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Emerging story
In August 2020, social media users began sharing the claim. It soon went viral.
Misbar’s Analysis
Recently more misleading information about (SARS-CoV-2) began circulating on social media. The claim took multiple forms, all alleging COVID-19 death tolls were higher than those of past wars. One claim, made by Facebook user Kelly Sparks on August 4th 2020, stated that COVID-19 was responsible for more American deaths than those deaths attributed to WW1; the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan-US wars; and the terror attack at the World Trade Center in New York City on September 11th, 2001.
According to the CDC, as of August 12, there have been over 163,500 COVID-19 deaths in the US.
While this number does exceed the number of deaths attributed to each war and conflict mentioned individually, the claim is misleading because it implies that there are more COVID-19 deaths than the others combined.
116,708 Americans died in WWI, or “The Great War.” 58,222 Americans died in Vietnam. Those conflicts combined account for more deaths than the coronavirus did at the time the claim was made. An additional 36,500 US personnel died in the Karean war. According to the Washington Post another 5,000 US troops died in Iraq--that number is still slowly climbing. Furthermore, several sources put the US death toll in Afghanistan at around 3,270 and count just under 3,000 deaths resulting from the “911” terror attack at the US Trade Center in New York City on September 11th, 2001. The conflicts listed in the claim combined account for at least 222,698 American casualties, which is greater than the number of people who have died of COVID-19.
