By Rita Enemuru, Reporting
CLAIM:
A photo of breast cancer with the caption: “BREAST CANCER INTEL: Please, If you know of any lady battling BREAST CANCER of whatever stage, please advise her to contact: Dorothy@africacancerfoundation.org before March 7th, all medical expenses are free. Please, don’t keep this message to yourself, SHARE OR FORWARD to groups and save that woman’s life,” was a claim that went viral on WhatsApp from March 2023 till February 2024.
However, in the process of fact-checking the credibility of the post, Stonix News ran the image on TinEye and found out that the picture had also trended in 2017.
Further searches also revealed that the message was also posted by the africacancerfoundation in 2022, calling for free treatment of breast cancer patients which presupposes that it was only valid for 2022.
The fact-checking process on Facebook also revealed that the Facebook page of Truth’s Space has a video of the same information which was uploaded on February 4, 2024, with over 140 views.
Watch the video below:
In the comment section of the video, several Facebook users were pleading for the contact details of the said representative of the Africa Cancer Foundation, Dorothy, but the poster hasn’t provided information on her contact as of the time of filing this report.
Screenshots of the comments on the post.
Besides, on March 30, 2023, at 6:44a.m, Stonix News reporter had earlier, on the strength of the viral message, made a request to the foundation via its email contact: Dorothy@africacancerfoundation.org as regards rendering help to a patient, but was not responded to even as of the time of filing this report, almost a year after.
The letter read thus in part:
“Urgent help!
“Good morning, Dorothy Foundation. Hope this message meets you well.
“I want to thank you and your foundation for the good job and the lives you’ve been saving through your foundation. God will continue to uphold you.
“I work as a journalist…. in Delta State while my family is based in Ibadan, Oyo State.
There’s a development that’s not pleasant – a woman is battling with a huge lump beside her left breast diagnosed as INVASIVE CARCINOMA.
“I had earlier run into your publicity to save women in whatever stage of any form of breast cancer which I had shared widely unknown to me that I needed the help myself!
“Please, help us, although the deadline was March 7…
“Anticipating your positive response.
“Thank you.”
OUR FINDINGS
In an Instagram post made on the official Instagram page of Africa Cancer foundation, it was revealed that the foundation had, on February 4, 2024, debunked the information stating that the free treatment was only valid in 2022 and that there was no free surgeries for 2024 due to inadequate funds.
The post read: “Unfortunately, no free surgeries are being offered in 2024 as the funding is not there. The message being circulated is out-of-date and no longer relevant.”
Photos of the Instagram post made by Africa Cancer Foundation
OUR VERDICT
The claim by social media users that the Africa Cancer Foundation is conducting free surgeries for breast cancer patients in 2024 is MISLEADING as the information about free surgery was only VALID in 2022.
CONCLUSION
Obviously, the same message asking patients to contact the email address “….before 7th March” has no particular year attached to the date and month. As a result, the misleading claim has been gaining traction on social media since 2023 though the exercise has expired. It suffices to assume that posters and sharers of the misleading message on social media are doing so to harvest, as it were, traffic.
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