Pfizer CEO has not been arrested by the military

A number of posts on social media claim that Dr Albert Bourla, the CEO of Pfizer, one of the companies to create a Covid-19 vaccine, has been arrested by the military. 

There’s no evidence this is true.

Some of the posts appear to include a screenshot of a now-deleted article on a website, which describes itself as containing “humor [sic], parody, and satire.” The headline reads: “Military arrests Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla”.

The article claims Mr Bourla was “last seen in the US on November 8, 2022”. But this isn’t the case—he was photographed at an event in New York on 4 April of this year.

Pfizer confirmed to Full Fact that the claim was false.

False claims like this may undermine people’s trust in vaccines or medicines which could lead them to make decisions about their health based on bad information. This isn’t the first time we’ve fact checked misinformation about Mr Bourla, including false claims he’d resigned, been arrested, said he wanted to decrease the population by 50% and that his wife had died after having the vaccine. 

One of the posts alludes to the fact that Mr Bourla is a veterinarian, which is true. He earned his veterinary degree and doctorate in the biotechnology of reproduction in Greece before joining Pfizer in 1993.

Image courtesy of Amos Ben Gershom