An image has been shared repeatedly in multiple posts on social media and on online forums which claim it could show US President Donald Trump receiving hospital treatment after he tested positive for the novel coronavirus in October 2020. The claim is false; the image has been doctored from a stock photo which has circulated online since at least April 2020, more than four months before Trump announced he had contracted Covid-19.
The image was published here on Weibo on October, 4, 2020.
Screenshot taken on October 9, 2020, of the misleading Weibo post It purports to show a man with blonde hair receiving hospital treatment.
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The post's simplified Chinese-language caption translates to English as: "Widely shared in Taiwan and on Instagram, not sure if it's true or not #TrumpDevelopedSymptomsSuchAsFever#".
On October 2, 2020, Trump announced on Twitter he and First Lady Melania Trump had tested positive for Covid-19, as AFP reported here.
The same image was also included in online forum posts here, here and here alongside a similar claim.
The claim is misleading; the image has been doctored.
A reverse image search on Google found this image credited to Kiryl Lis on Adobe Stock.
Below is a screenshot comparison of the doctored image (L) and the Adobe Stock picture credited to Kiryl Lis (R):
Screenshot comparison of the misleading image (L) and the Adobe Stock picture credited to Kiryl Lis (R) Also Read: US Presidential Election 2020: These Aren't Discarded Mail-in Ballots
The Adobe Stock picture has been doctored to include blonde hair in the misleading posts. The original image shows a person with grey hair.
The picture's caption states: "Intubated adult white man under ventilator lying in coma in intensive care department. Patient in critical state."
The same picture of a person with grey hair was published in this April 30, 2020 article by US daily newspaper Tahlequah Daily Press and this May 2, 2020 article by US magazine Pharmacy Practice News.
Both articles were published several months before Trump revealed he had tested positive for Covid-19.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by BOOM staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)