PHILIPSBURG:---Lately a hoax(1) has been circulating on social media about HIV infected canned food from Thailand.
This hoax claims that the government of Thailand has issued a warning about canned foods that had purportedly been contaminated with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV).
Emergency News
Radio 1 FM announced that Thai Govt. confirmed:
Emergency notification: Do NOT eat canned food especially those canned fruits manufactured in Thailand . There were over 200 HIV carriers instructed by their leader to contaminate the products of the canned food factory by their blood. The information was confirmed by the government this morning. In order not to let the people get infected
Thai agencies, including the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, and Food and Drug Administration of Thailand, had announced that Thai canned products have been thoroughly inspected and are certified according to international standards (GMP and HACCP) before the products could be shipped out. In fact, the heat treatment during the processing method will eliminate all harmful microbes and other viruses that may existed. Moreover, HIV virus needs a human host cell to live and it does not live long outside the human body. Therefore, it is not possible that canned products are contaminated with HIV as claimed.
Hoaxes are usually in the form of “chain e-mails” or “viral social media claims” and can be easily suspected to be bogus when they contain certain key characteristics:
1. The author is anonymous
2. The author is supposedly a famous person
3. There’s a reference to a legitimate source that completely contradicts the information in the message
4. The message is often riddled with spelling errors
5. The author just loves using exclamation points
6. The message argues that it is not false
7. There’s math involved
See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm0LwscDYHs
It is strongly advised to consider researching a suspected hoax on the internet before believing and/or distributing it further.
Suggested sites: http://hoax-slayer.com/ http://www.factcheck.org/ http://www.snopes.com/
Dr. E Best , Inspector General
(1) A hoax is a deliberately fabricated falsehood made to masquerade as the truth. It is distinguishable from errors in observation or judgment, rumors, urban legends, pseudoscience’s and April Fools' Day events that are passed along in good faith by believers or as jokes.