RFK Jr. Pumps Up COVID Mortality Rate
NewsGuard’s “False Claim of the Week” highlights a claim from NewsGuard’s False Claim Fingerprints, a proprietary database of provably false claims and their debunks. This week’s claim is that the U.S. had the highest COVID-19 mortality rate in the world. It is NewsGuard’s “False Claim of the Week” due to its widespread appearance across social media platforms and websites, its high engagement levels, and the high-profile nature of the sources promoting it. Those three factors, as well as its significant subject matter and potential for harm, make it our False Claim of the Week.
What’s happening: Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is falsely claiming that the U.S. had the highest COVID-19 mortality rate compared to all other countries, citing the inaccuracy to criticize Dr. Anthony Fauci, who helped lead the U.S.’s COVID-19 response.
A closer look: While the claim has been circulating online since 2024, it was given a big boost in late July 2026 by RFK Jr., as Fauci was facing tough questioning in the U.S. Senate about his handling of the pandemic.
- In a July 27 interview on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle,” Kennedy said: “We had in our country, because of Dr. Fauci’s leadership and other reasons, we had the highest mortality rate from COVID of any country in the world. We literally did worse than any nation in the world.” Show host Laura Ingraham did not challenge Kennedy’s claim.
- Kennedy’s comments from “The Ingraham Angle” were widely shared on X. For example, conservative X user @GuntherEagleman reposted a clip of Kennedy’s remarks in an X post and stated, “Highest COVID death rate in the world under [Fauci’s] leadership.” The post received 648,000 views and 15,000 likes.
- Kennedy made the same claim in an Aug. 2 interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” stating, “We had the highest death rate from COVID of any nation on earth.” CNN anchor Dana Bash challenged the assertion, stating, “Let me just say, because I’ve heard you say that before on the death rate from COVID, that’s not accurate.” Kennedy held his ground, stating, “What I said was accurate. We had the highest death rate from COVID of any point.” Bash then interjected, “There are other countries that had higher.”
Actually: Bash is right and Kennedy is wrong: Thirteen other countries had higher COVID-19 mortality rates than the U.S.
- According to data collected by Johns Hopkins University, from January 2020 to March 2023, Peru had the highest COVID mortality rate of any nation, with 665.84 deaths per 100,000 people, while the U.S. COVID mortality rate was 341.11 deaths per 100,000, placing the U.S. in 14th place for that metric.
- Other countries with higher COVID mortality rates than the U.S. included Bulgaria, Hungary, and Lithuania.
The same Johns Hopkins University data showed that the U.S. had 1.1 million deaths from COVID, the highest number of reported COVID deaths among any nation. However, the U.S. is the third-most populous nation on Earth, and experiencing the highest total number of COVID deaths does not necessarily mean it also had the highest rate of COVID deaths.
- Indeed, if the U.S. had the same COVID mortality rate as Peru, the total COVID death toll in the U.S. would have been approximately 2.2 million deaths, twice the actual number.
Neither the Department of Health and Human Services nor Fox News responded to an email from NewsGuard seeking comment on the matter. HHS also did not respond to a phone message from NewsGuard.
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This newsletter was edited by Sofia Rubinson and Eric Effron.
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