Several website articles are circulating on social media claiming that Department of Health Secretary (DOH) Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire is endorsing a cure for numerous diseases. These are fake.
The articles emerged as early as July 6 and continue to spread this week. It bore the spurious headline:
“Matapos ang cleaning ng blood vessels, finally naalis na ng matatanda ang high blood pressure at 9 pang supposedly na “incurable” na sakit! (After cleaning the blood vessels, elders finally got rid of high blood pressure and nine more supposedly incurable diseases!)”
It featured a supposed interview with Vergeire advocating the use of the product called Neocardia, a pill supplement that claims to cure hypertension, help with weight loss and improve eyesight.
This is fake. The DOH also debunked this story in an Aug. 2 Facebook post where it warned the public against the erroneous article “maliciously” using Vergeire’s name in selling a “false cure against cardiovascular diseases.”
Back in June, VERA Files Fact Check debunked a similar Neocardia ad that illicitly used the name of CNN Philippines and cardiologist Doc Willie Ong. Neocardia is not approved by the Food and Drug Administration as a drug or dietary supplement.
The fake articles emerged the same week the Senate started its probe on fake online ads using the names of popular personalities to endorse fraudulent food and health products.
At least three different website links – firstnewsmedical.ru, zenex.online, zephyrmist.site – carried the article published by a generic website called “Medical newspaper”, collectively garnering over 12,000 interactions, according to social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle.
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(Editor’s Note: VERA Files has partnered with Facebook to fight the spread of disinformation. Find out more about this partnership and our methodology.)