NEIL Oliver has been backed by broadcasting watchdog Ofcom after he falsely claimed that healthy people were dying of a “turbo cancer” and implied it was linked to the Covid vaccine.

Speaking on his show on GB News, Oliver also wrongly asserted that Pfizer chief executive Albert Bourla had repeatedly said one-third of everyone on earth would get “turbo cancer” in the near future.

However, Ofcom refused to investigate some 70 complaints about the segment, stating that Oliver’s comments had been his “personal view” and the audience was not misled.

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The broadcast in question happened on January 13 and saw Oliver discuss Pfizer’s recent $43 billion acquisition of Seagen, a biotechnology company with a focus on cancer treatments.

He said: “While young people drop dead and otherwise healthy people of all ages are harvested in hitherto unheard of numbers by heart disease and turbo cancer, our old friend Pfizer has been spending some of its recently acquired massive wealth buying companies that develop drugs to treat heart disease and turbo cancer.

“I don’t know about you, but until just a few months ago, I’d never heard of turbo cancer … Fuel injected, maybe with a bottle of nitrous oxide on the side for the sudden terrifying burst of speed across the line to unexpected death.”

He added that Bourla had “been all over the media predicting turbo cancers will affect a third of the world in the years ahead”.

Bourla had not predicted that. In a press release issued by Pfizer about the Seagen takeover, he had said: “Cancer remains a leading cause of death, and one in three people in the US will receive a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime.”

The claims of “turbo cancer” have widely appeared in conspiracy circles and also been widely debunked.

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An Agence France-Presse fact check about “turbo cancer” from July 2023 stated: “No link between Covid-19 vaccination and cancer has been established in scientific literature, but social media posts claim new research proves Pfizer's vaccine causes the disease. This is false.”

Other fact checks, including from Reuters, have come to the same conclusion.

But Ofcom stood by Oliver’s monologue, refusing to act on complaints he was peddling conspiracy theories and misleading his audience.

The media watchdog said: “In line with freedom of expression, our rules allow broadcasters to cover controversial themes and topics.

“We recognise that these brief comments were the presenter’s personal view and did not materially mislead the audience, we therefore will not be pursuing this further.”

Journalist Sam Bright commented on social media: “Oliver's claims are totally false, yet Ofcom has ruled that Oliver didn't break its rules and that he ‘did not materially mislead the audience’. An absolute joke.

“Specifically, he suggested that Pfizer was intending to profit from this health crisis by buying companies that treat ‘turbo cancer’.

“If Ofcom can't clamp down on this sort of wild, dangerous misinformation, it needs to be replaced.”

Oliver, a former BBC presenter, has leant into the peddling of false conspiracy theories, even selling merchandise with his face and the slogan “conspiracy Gandalf”.

He has railed against Covid lockdowns and safety measures, including the vaccine, and claimed that they are part of a push to impose an authoritarian one-world government.