Claim: Singapore has declared COVID-19 to be “a global hoax” after doctors there performed the first autopsy going against the WHO’s guidelines. The disease is not a virus but “a bacteria that has been exposed to radiation and causes human death by clotting in the blood”. The country’s health ministry “immediately changed the Covid-19 treatment protocol and gave aspirin to its positive patients”.
Fact: The Singapore government has denied the claims, saying no such autopsy was performed nor were its protocols changed. Moreover, COVID-19 is caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, not bacteria or blood-clotting. Some patients may develop complications that include bacterial infection, which can be treated by antibiotics. Lastly, the WHO never issued guidelines against performing autopsies.
In October 2024, multiple Pakistani social media users posted a conspiracy theory that the coronavirus disease of 2019, or COVID-19, is not caused by a virus but “a bacteria that has been exposed to radiation and causes human death by clotting in the blood”. The alleged revelation was attributed to research by doctors in Singapore, who “did not listen to WHO [World Health Organization] protocol and performed an autopsy” on a patient.
The viral text, which Soch Fact Check also received as a WhatsApp message marked “Forwarded many times,” goes on to state that Singapore’s Health Ministry “immediately changed the Covid-19 treatment protocol and gave aspirin to its positive patients”, before allegedly sending over 14,000 patients home.
Singapore’s doctors, the claim further alleges, termed COVID-19 “a global hoax” and said it could be treated with “antibiotic tablets”, “anti-inflammatory” medication, and “anticoagulants (aspirin)”.
The posts also emerged in Thai language here, here, here, and here in late November and early December 2024.
COVID-19 — a disease that emerged in the fourth quarter of 2019 in Wuhan, China — is caused by a coronavirus called SARS-CoV-2, or severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, as well as its variants. A list of treatment guidelines and medications is available on the websites of the CDC and the WHO.
Fact or Fiction?
Soch Fact Check used keywords from the claim in a Google search, which led us to a notice published 15 June 2021 by the Singapore government; it is titled, “False message circulating on changes to treatment protocols following an alleged COVID-19 patient autopsy.”
“The allegations are all false and the message did not originate from the Ministry of Health, Singapore. Earlier versions of this message, citing countries such as Italy and Russia instead of Singapore, have been exposed as untrue,” the Singapore government stated, adding three facts to substantiate its advisory:
- Singapore did not perform such an autopsy on a COVID-19 patient nor made such claims about the pathophysiology of COVID-19 infection. There has also not been any such resultant change in our treatment protocols for COVID-19 patients.
- COVID-19 is caused by a virus, not a bacterium. Based on many scientific studies and current evidence, COVID-19 is caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The World Health Organization (WHO) has also previously debunked the myth that COVID-19 is caused by bacteria, not a virus. Some people who are infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus may develop a bacterial infection as a complication – this is also seen in other viral illnesses such as influenza. In such cases, antibiotics may be prescribed.
- COVID-19 cannot be cured with aspirin. Aspirin has no direct effect on the virus that causes COVID-19. If you feel unwell, see a doctor early to get tested and treated.
The Singapore government posted the same message on its Facebook page.
On its website, the WHO has also clarified that COVID-19 “is caused by a virus, NOT by bacteria”. It adds, “The virus that causes COVID-19 is in a family of viruses called Coronaviridae. Antibiotics do not work against viruses. Some people who become ill with COVID-19 can also develop a bacterial infection as a complication. In this case, antibiotics may be recommended by a health care provider.”
It is, however, important to note that antibiotics only treat bacteria, not viruses.
In the Fact or Fiction section of the WHO’s South-East Asia page, the body explains that COVID-19 “cannot be cured with aspirin”.
Similarly, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also categorises COVID-19 as a virus, not bacteria.
‘The first country’?
The viral text claimed that Singapore “became the first country in the world to perform an autopsy (post-mortem) of a COVID-19 body” and that “China already knows this, but has never released its report”. This is false.
Singapore reported its first death from COVID-19 on 21 March 2020, according to the country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as well as various international media reports. China, on the other hand, published the results from its first post-mortem on 28 February 2020 in the Journal of Forensic Medicine. Titled “Gross examination report of a COVID-19 death autopsy,” the study is available here.
Read more: WhatsApp rumours are false, Covid-19 is not a bacteria
The South China Morning Post (SCMP) also reported on the study, detailing how the autopsy “highlights how illness targets lungs”.
Reports by Global Times and the China Global Television Network (CGTN), published 29 February 2020 and 2 March 2020, cited Professor Liang Liu, who led the study and is the dean of the Department of Forensic Medicine at Huazhong University of Science and Technology’s (HUST) Tongji Medical College.
In an interview with China Central Television (CCTV), Professor Liang Liu said the autopsy was completed on 16 February 2020 at the Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital.
Since the autopsy in China was completed on 16 February 2020 and Singapore reported its first death on 21 March 2020, the latter is not the first country to perform a post-mortem. It is also false that the former “never released its report”.
Moreover, had there been such a discovery that COVID is “a bacteria that has been exposed to radiation” or if Singapore’s Health Ministry had “evacuated more than 14,000 patients in one day and sent them home”, reputable media outlets would have reported on it.
In June 2020, Soch Fact Check debunked a similar claim when it was linked to Italy.
Intravascular coagulation, studies
Various studies have indicated that blood-clotting may occur before or after a COVID-19 diagnosis and can impact some bodily functions; however, it is a complication arising from COVID-19 and does not change the fact that COVID-19 is a virus, not a bacteria.
According to the US National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) “is a rare but serious condition that causes abnormal blood clotting throughout the body’s blood vessels” and that “is a rare complication of COVID-19”.
“People who develop DIC are more likely to have severe complications, like organ failure, that can often be life-threatening,” the NHLBI added.
In a May 2020 fact-check, PolitiFact noted that one of the pathologists on a study, which was hinted at in the viral claim when it was circulating in connection with Italy, confirmed that the “study does not contradict the fact that COVID-19 is a virus that cannot be treated with antibiotics”. The findings have now been peer-reviewed and published in The Lancet.
In its article, AFP Fact Check included a link to a video interview of Dr Sylvie Briand, a French physician who is now the director of the WHO’s Pandemic and Epidemic Diseases Department. She said, “Using antibiotics to treat COVID-19 will not help, because it’s a virus and not a bacteria. But what we have seen in some hospitalised patients is that they were given antibiotics, not to treat COVID-19, but to prevent superinfection by other bacteria because some people are really fragile and we fear that, on top of COVID-19, they can get also (sic) another bacterial infection.”
Interestingly, the WHO never issued guidelines against conducting autopsies; it did, however, publish guidelines in September 2020 to safely manage the dead body of a person who died due to COVID-19, according to the publication.
Prior iterations
AFP Fact Check also debunked a video that emerged in Pakistan back on 7 January 2021, posted (archive) by the YouTube channel HCN HYDERABAD CITY NEWS with the title, “Corona Patient Ka Postmortem#CORONA ki Haqeeqat Aai Saamne [Post-mortem of a coronavirus patient; truth of #CORONA revealed]”.
The claim has circulated in the Philippines, Nigeria, and India as well. It was also linked to the Russian health ministry a few years ago.
Virality
Soch Fact Check found that the claim was shared here, here, here, here, here, here, and here on Facebook.
In August 2021, it was posted as the caption of different Instagram posts.
Conclusion: The Singapore government has said the claims are “false” and that no such autopsy was performed nor were its protocols changed. COVID-19 is a disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, not bacteria or blood-clotting. Some patients may develop complications that include bacterial infection, which can be treated by antibiotics. Lastly, the WHO never issued guidelines against performing autopsies.
Background image in cover photo: Raymond Zhu
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