Two photos which show human throats have been shared hundreds of times in multiple Facebook posts warning about the seriousness of the novel coronavirus, which causes the disease COVID-19.
"The post’s caption states in part: “When you get sick of CORONAVIRUS youre going to have a fever. Lots of fever. The highest fever ever given you. Its not going to look like typical flu fevers. / Youre going to breathe slowly, like they put a sponge in your nose. When you try to fill your lungs by inhaling hard, youre going to feel like youre still lacking the air. And that will scare you.”", The photos were also shared on Facebook here and here\xa0alongside a similar claim., But the photos have been shared in a misleading context; a combined reverse image search on TinEye and keyword searches on Google found both photos circulating online before the COVID-19 pandemic., First photo, The first photo is a stock image available here on Adobe Stock. It also appeared in this Spanish-language report about tonsillitis, published on March 27, 2019., Below is a screenshot comparison showing the first photo in the misleading posts (L) and the stock photo used in the 2019 news report (R):, Second photo, The second photo appears in this US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) web page. Its caption states the photo dates back to 1958 and shows a strep throat., Below is a screenshot comparison showing the second photo in the misleading posts (L) and the CDC photo (R):, The claim about the severity of COVID-19 for all patients is also misleading., Dr Eduardo De Vito, head of pulmonology at the Lanari Institute in Buenos Aires, told AFP that people diagnosed with COVID-19 "are not necessarily" going to experience the highest fever they have ever had, contrary to the misleading claim. "It\s similar to the common flu fever.”\n\tDr De Vito added that "only a small percentage of patients" will have difficulty breathing., While anyone can catch and become seriously ill with COVID-19, the World Health Organization states in this information page: "Most people (about 80%) recover from the disease without needing hospital treatment.”, , Copyright © AFP 2017-2020.  All rights reserved.  Users can access and consult this website and use the share features available for personal, private, and non-commercial purposes.  Any other use, in particular any reproduction, communication to the public or distribution of the content of this website, in whole or in part, for any other purpose and/or by any other means, without a specific licence agreement signed with AFP, is strictly prohibited.  The subject matter depicted or included via links within the Fact Checking content is provided to the extent necessary for correct understanding of the verification of the information concerned.  AFP has not obtained any rights from the authors or copyright owners of this third party content and shall incur no liability in this regard.  AFP and its logo are registered trademarks.
These photos have circulated in reports before the COVID-19 pandemic | AFP Fact Check