Had 2012 Summer Olympics predicted about 2020 Pandemic ?

Claim: It is being said that the 2012 London Olympics had already predicted the coronavirus pandemic.

Background: With the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, starting 2019, various conspiracy theories, memes and predictions started circulating on social media across the globe. One of which is that the 2012 London Olympics had already predicted a global pandemic. As per the theory, a segment of the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in London predicted the coronavirus crisis.

The opening ceremony was four hours long and the conspiracy theory concentrates on a 15-minute session that as designed to honour and celebrate Great Britain’s National Health Service, a British children’s hospital, and the nation’s body of children’s literature.

Cause: The image, where nurses in vintage costumes standing among children in antique-style hospital beds that glow with light, has been taken from the opening ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics and shared several times on Facebook. The image also shows a giant sculpture of a sleeping baby in the background. The image has been captioned as “They told us in 2012”.

A video was added to further explain the image, wherein nurses put the children to bed as a lullaby plays. The nurses can be seen putting their fingers over their lips with the “shh” gesture to tell the children to be quiet and go to sleep. The video then adds still photos of former US President Barack Obama with a finger over his lips in the “shh” gesture, along with similar photos of former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and other famous people.

All these acts were translated as a prediction to the pandemic in 2020. Various websites like Myth Detector, Reuters, The Guardian etc. checked the facts and concluded the claim to be FALSE.

The opening ceremony of 2012 Olympics was a celebration of a British institution and its culture. It was in no way depicting or related to the novel coronavirus.

Also Read: Social media disruptions claim COVID-19 vaccine causes brain damage, among other things

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