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| - Last Updated on September 11, 2024 by Nivedita
Quick Take
A social media post claims that an episode of an American animated sitcom predicted Monkeypox. We fact-checked and found this claim to be False.
The Claim
A post on Facebook with the caption, ‘This is just crazy, but they absolutely never Miss #monkeypox #virus #crazy displays 3 pictures from The Simpsons claiming that it predicted the monkeypox outbreak. The screenshot of the post is attached below.
Fact Check
Did ‘The Simpsons’ predict monkeypox outbreak?
No. The images shown in the claim are misleading and have been fabricated to structure the claim. The meme features images from two different episodes of ‘The Simpsons’, and neither one of them predicts or mentions monkeypox.
The first frame in which Homer is seen drinking beer next to a monkey can be found in episode “Girly Edition” from the ninth season of the series.
A twitter post claims that God brought back leprosy, and we are calling it monkeypox.
The claim depicts that the image shown is from Episode 17 of Season 21, but the two images depicting Homer (the character of the show) with a red rash are from episode 3 of season 17, titled “Milhouse of Sand and Fog.” The image which further confirms the episode and season can be seen on the IMDB website. Secondly, during the episode, the character ‘Homer’ is infected with chickenpox, not monkeypox, after his daughter Maggie was infected, which can be confirmed by watching the episode or reading the story online.
It must be noted that even though the monkeypox rash might appear similar to other more typical infectious rashes, leading to confusion between chickenpox and monkeypox, they are completely different diseases. Their causative agents are different, i.e., monkeypox is an orthopoxvirus, while chickenpox is caused by the varicella-zoster virus, which also causes shingles.
In conclusion, the frames are from two different episodes that have been taken out of context. Thus, the claim is false.
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