Do COVID-19 vaccines cause an increase in aggressive forms of cancer? No, that's not true: There is no scientific evidence to support this claim. Health officials recommend the shots for patients most at risk from coronavirus.
The claim appeared in a video (archived here) on TikTok on August 4, 2023, under the title (translated from Thai to English by Lead Stories) "Turbo cancer again." It opened:
Why do people get weak easily?
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Thu Nov 16 17:46:42 2023 UTC)
The video claims that many famous people got cancer very quickly, allegedly because of the vaccine, called "turbo cancer."
The claim originated from a family practitioner, Dr. Charles Hoffe, who has become a leading Canadian anti-vaccine activist. He claimed in 2022 that he had observed a dramatic increase in stage 4 cancer diagnoses after administering the COVID vaccine.
"New cancers are being diagnosed, the tumors are bigger than ever, they seem to grow very aggressively, spread very aggressively, and are very resistant to treatment. So this is nicknamed 'turbo cancer,'" Hoffe has said on his social network.
Hoffe talked about his views on an online show called "Good Morning CHD," shared on Rumble by Children's Health Defense, which was banned from Facebook in 2022 for spreading misinformation about COVID. Hoffe also claimed in 2021 that the vaccine caused heart damage and in 2023 that the vaccine increased the risk of contracting COVID.
"Turbo cancer" is unproven and is backed by no scientific evidence. The Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, a cancer treatment and research institution in New York City, writes, "None of the vaccines interact with or alter your DNA in any way. They cannot cause cancer. There is no truth to the myth that somehow the COVID-19 vaccine could inactivate the genes that suppress tumors."
Many organizations, such as the National Cancer Institute, have confirmed that there are no vaccines, including COVID vaccines, that make cancer therapy less effective and that cancer patients are also able to receive vaccines safely.
The World Health Organization continues to recommend that public get COVID vaccines and confirms that they are safe.
