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On Monday (September 13), Nicki Minaj shared with her fans on Twitter that she would not be attending this year's Met Gala due to the vaccine mandate. The rapper went on to explain that she has not yet received the vaccine as she wanted to do her own research beforehand. Minaj then shared an anecdote about a friend in a claim that has now been debunked by Dr. Anthony Fauci.
"My cousin in Trinidad won't get the vaccine cuz his friend got it & became impotent," she said in one of her tweets. "His testicles became swollen. His friend was weeks away from getting married, now the girl called off the wedding. So just pray on it & make sure you're comfortable with ur decision, not bullied."
Dr. Fauci, who sits as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was brought on by Jake Tapper as a guest for CNN's The Lead and was asked whether there was any truth to Minaj's claims.
"The answer to that, Jake, is a resounding no," Fauci said. "There's no evidence that it happens nor is there any mechanistic reason to imagine that it would happen. So the answer to your question is no."
"There's a lot of misinformation, mostly on social media, and the only way we know to counter mis- and disinformation is to provide a lot of correct information and to essentially debunk these kinds of claims, which may be innocent on her part, I'm not blaming her for anything," Fauci said. "But she should be thinking twice about propagating information that really has no basis except as a one-off anecdote, and that's not what science is all about."
Dr. Fauci is far from the first doctor to debunk Minaj's claims regarding the vaccine, as other public health experts have chimed in as well. Dr. Lena Wen also made reassurances that impotence is not a side effect of any of the major vaccines, including Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson. However, Wen did say that getting COVID-19 can have adverse health effects for the male reproductive system.
To learn more about the COVID-19 vaccine, click here.