On February 8, 2021, Facebook announced another update to their policies to address COVID-19 and vaccine disinformation and misinformation on their platforms.

Shortly after this announcement, Facebook permanently banned the Instagram accounts of anti-vaxx industry leaders Del Bigtree and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

While removing these accounts was certainly a step in the right direction, one week later, Facebook has not demonstrated the willingness or ability to thoroughly, accurately and equally enforce its stated policies. It’s time for Facebook to #StopAntiVaxxers and Finish the Job.

The Disinformation Dozen

Guy Rosen, who oversees content decisions recently told the Guardian “[Facebook] will begin enforcing this policy immediately, with a particular focus on Pages, groups and accounts that violate these rules.”

Based on reports from The Center for Countering Digital Hate and other organizations that have been monitoring the activities and growth of anti-vaxx pages and groups, the disinformation dozen is a list of some of the most frequent violators of Facebook’s new (and old) policies.

Facebook’s policy states that “Groups, Pages and accounts on Facebook and Instagram that repeatedly share these debunked claims may be removed altogether.” Each of these accounts unquestionably rises to that level, and yet Facebook has taken action on only two so far.

We need your help to hold Facebook accountable to Finish the Job and sign up to receive updates as we keep the pressure on.

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