Clinics in the Philippines are turning away people with COVID-19 symptoms, because of a advisory from the department of health.
Below is a screenshot of the misleading Facebook post:, The text in the purported advisory reads: "If you have any of the following solely or in combination:\n\t- Fever\n\t- Cough or Colds\n\t- Headache\n\t- Joint pain\n\t- Muscle pain\n\t- Stomach ache/diarrhea\n\t- History of travel outside the Philippines in the last 14 days or in areas where CoVid19 has been reported or clustered\n\t- Exposure to person with CoVid19\n\t- Exposure to person under evaluation for CoVid19\n\tWE WILL NOT BE ABLE TO SEE YOU AT THIS CLINIC AND INSTEAD PLEASE PROCEED TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM FOR PROPER EVALUATION / THIS IS IN COMPLIANCE WITH DOH AND OTHER GOVERNMENT REGULATORY HEALTH DIRECTIVES"., The COVID-19 pandemic has killed more than 8,800 people worldwide and infected almost 210,000 others, as reported\xa0here\xa0by AFP on March 19., The image was also shared alongside a similar claim\xa0here, here and here on Facebook., , The claim is false; the Philippine Department of Health published\xa0this post on its Facebook page on\xa0March 16, 2020, denying it had issued the advisory., The post\xa0states: “The circulating health advisory is not an official DOH issuance.”, , Below is a screenshot of the statement, which includes the purported advisory in the misleading posts marked with a red “X”:, "The posts Tagalog-language caption\xa0translates to English as: “Fact Check: The shown Health Advisory is not from the Department of Health. The DOH invites the public to only get their information about COVID-19 from official accounts of the Department”.", The Philippine Department of Health says 17 people have died and 202\xa0others have been infected with COVID-19 as of 4pm on March 18, 2020., "In a response, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered almost half of the countrys population to stay home for the next month in an effort to curb the rising number of COVID-19 cases, according to this AFP report.", This March 17, 2020 DOH advisory states people who have interacted\xa0within one metre\xa0of COVID-19 patients should\xa0follow the instructions from Philippine\xa0health authorities so they can be referred to designated hospitals. Those who have had contact with a patient\xa0beyond a metre have been\xa0advised to self-monitor and seek medical help if\xa0symptoms appear., , 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.
The Philippine Department of Health says it did not issue this advisory | AFP Fact Check