No evidence Shinzo Abe was assassinated over his response to COVID-19

Authorities in Japan are working to piece together how and why a gunman assassinated former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe using a homemade firearm on July 8.

Police said Tetsuya Yamagami, the 41-year-old shooter, denied having a political motive and told investigators he wanted to kill Abe because he believed Abe was affiliated with an organization he disliked, according to reports from the Guardian and other outlets. 

Police did not identify the organization, but Japanese media reported it was a religious group that the shooter’s mother donated money to before she went bankrupt. The leader of the Japan branch of the Unification Church, whose members are colloquially referred to as "Moonies" and are believed by some experts to act like a cult, said Yamagami’s mother was a member. 

The investigation into Abe’s assassination is continuing as of July 11. But amid the information gap, misinformation over what happened is spreading online.

One conspiratorial Instagram post baselessly suggested that Abe was killed for shunning the COVID-19 vaccines and embracing the drug ivermectin as he led Japan’s pandemic response.

"Assassinated Japanese P.M. didn’t follow (World Economic Forum) orders," said the July 10 post. "Didn’t mandate vaccines, sent 1.6 million doses back and gave citizens ivermectin. Make sense now?"

The post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)

The post is unsubstantiated and factually misleading; there’s no evidence Abe was killed over his COVID-19 response, and that response did not involve promoting ivermectin over vaccines.

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The notion that Japan under Abe had abandoned its vaccine rollout and started treating COVID-19 patients with ivermectin gained traction in October 2021 thanks to a false blog post from far-right radio host Hal Turner, who has a history of pushing conspiracy theories. 

The Japanese government does not mandate COVID-19 vaccination.

Japan in September 2021 recalled about 1.63 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccines after a human error in production led to contamination.

But Japan never stopped all vaccination efforts. The country has administered more than 280 million vaccine doses as of July 11, according to Our World in Data and Reuters. About 81% of the country has been fully vaccinated, according to Our World in Data. 

Ivermectin, an antiparasitic drug, is not listed among the medications approved for COVID-19 by the Japanese government. (U.S. federal health agencies also do not approve ivermectin to treat or prevent COVID-19.)

An Instagram post claimed that Abe was assassinated because he "didn’t mandate vaccines, sent 1.6 million doses back and gave citizens ivermectin."

There is no evidence that Abe was killed for this reason; the investigation into his assassination continues, but police have said the shooter denied a political motive, according to reports.

The Instagram post built on previously debunked allegations that Japan scrapped its vaccination efforts to focus on prescribing ivermectin for COVID-19. Although the country recalled some tainted Moderna shots, it continued vaccinating and did not authorize using ivermectin. 

We rate this post False.