Washington (AFP)

US billionaire Bill Gates swept aside conspiracy theories spread on social media on Thursday that accuse him of being the source of the Covid-19 pandemic.

"It's a bad combination of pandemic, social media and people looking for simple explanations," he said in an interview with CNN.

Fake news articles and doctored photos have gone viral on social media, shared in many languages. A video accuses Bill Gates of wanting to "eliminate 15% of the population" under the guise of vaccinating the population. She has been seen millions of times on YouTube.

"Our foundation has given more money than any other group to buy vaccines in order to save lives," said Bill Gates, hoping that these conspiracy theories will not make the population resistant to the vaccine when it is released. point.

He has allocated $ 250 million for the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic and his foundation has invested billions of dollars over the past 20 years in the development of health systems in the poorest countries.

Since the start of the pandemic, AFP fact-checking teams have uncovered dozens of anti-Bill Gates rumors, in many languages ​​and on various social networks, from Facebook to Instagram.

Bill Gates, who calls for distributing drugs and vaccines to those in need and not to highest bidders, is accused of exploiting the crisis to "control people", but also of a mass poisoning plot Africa. Others assure that he was arrested by the FBI for "biological terrorism".

"I deeply believe in the fact that the truth will be recognized," and those conspiracy theories foiled, added Bill Gates.

Bill Gates is one of the favorite figures of trolls and other conspiracy theorists who offer the craziest explanations for the pandemic.

Beyond Bill Gates, the pandemic has fueled conspiracy theories but also rumors and "fake news", especially in Latin America.

In Ecuador for example, it has brought in its wake a trail of false information, ranging from corpses thrown into the sea to the discovery of dead on the beaches, through the proliferation of miracle cures.

© 2020 AFP