A netizen on Facebook (FB) warned people against eating fish in Antique, hours after heavy waves partially destroyed a public cemetery in the municipality of Sebaste in Antique.
“[We have] not issued any advisory to avoid the consumption of fish in Antique this week,” the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) – Provincial Fisheries Office in Antique told VERA Files Fact Check in a Sept. 18 email.
“Varieties of sea fish caught from coastal waters of Antique are not known for feeding on dead bodies. Popular fishes often consumed in the state such as sardine, mackerel and tuna are mainly feeding on plankton, algae and small living organisms,” the BFAR office explained.
“They are not known to eat [the] flesh of dead persons or animals,” they added. “We recommend that the public always fact check what they see on the internet.”
On Sept. 15, 1:04 p.m., the netizen posted an FB post carrying this warning in Hiligaynon:
“Pauhay anai kmo kaon isda kja??sa natabo nga na guba ang cemetery kang Sebaste rako patay ang naanod’delikado kag panigurado lng pra sa tanan
(Take a break from eating fish.. This, after the destruction of a cemetery in Sebaste which washed away corpses into the sea. This is dangerous, just making sure everyone is safe.)”
At around 7 a.m. of Sept. 15, members of Sebaste’s municipal disaster risk reduction and management office (MDRRMO) found a female corpse by the seashore, Ernesto Galido, head of Sebaste’s MDRRMO, told VERA Files Fact Check via phone call.
“Hindi namin masabi kung may nakakita na inaanod iyon sa dagat (We could not say whether someone saw [the corpse] being swept to the sea),” Galido said.
A screenshot of an FB Messenger group chat, carried by the erroneous post, claimed that an MDRRMO officer of Valderama, Antique, by the name of Leo Vitudio warned people against eating fish.
The message attributed to Vitudio read in part:
“Paborito gid ka LOKUS ang dead people nga ga lutaw sa dagat Kon dunot Ron lawas na. Never gid kmo magbakal as far as advice ka mga amigo ko nga mangingisda sa dagat.”
(Locusts are fond of corpses floating in the sea when their bodies are rotten. Never buy [fish], as advised by my fisherman friends.)
Vitudio has denied this.
“Thank you for your concern but please refrain from sharing or reporting/reposting this because gin name drop lang Ako dira (I was just name dropped there), it is not my post. Salamat gid nga madamo (Thank you very much). God bless us all,” he told RMN Kalibo reporter Jeffrey Dela Cruz on Sept. 16.
As many as 7,567 people shared the erroneous post on FB.
