For almost a year, a post accusing gas stations of hiding syringes infected with AIDS in gasoline pumps has been circulating on social networks. It is, however, a poison and size.
Since the arrival of the Internet, a lot of erroneous information has circulated on the network and some information has created a buzz when it is completely false. We must therefore pay particular attention to “unusual news”, especially those shared on social networks. Last poison relayed all over the world to date and most serious: gas stations are said to circulate syringes infected with HIV in fuel pumps.
Birth of intox in France
In France, it all started on December 15, 2017 when a group named “I love and respect our planet” Facebook post a photo showing a gasoline pump handle fitted with a syringe. “SHARE !!! Attention […] this is the new betrayal they are doing in gas stations. They put syringes infected with HIV (AIDS) into the fuel gun. Pay attention and spin! Shares can save lives! “, Is the post, now shared more than 272,000 times.
But not everyone is gullible. “What circulates in the open air is bullshit”, “it’s big nonsense (…) we are in the intoxicating … stupid!”, Note some Internet users, skeptical.
The roots of intoxication are more exotic
But this rumor is not limited to France. At the end of 2017, the same photo was circulating in the United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, Austria, the Czech Republic and even Italy. However, the cliché has no connection with Europe since it comes from the United States.
It was picked up by a motorist by the name of Jose Medina in California in May 2017. “Yesterday, on my way to work, my father stopped at a gas station in Moreno Valley to get gas. After paying inside, he went out to grab the tip of the pump and suddenly got pricked by a damn syringe placed there on purpose by a poor guy, ”his daughter Jacqueline told Facebook.
Shocked, Jose Medina then alerted the gas station employee who immediately removed the syringe with a towel. He then notified the police and had medical examinations without the HIV being mentioned.
The rumor that swells
Too late, social networks had already taken hold of the case, surfing on the psychosis of AIDS, while some Internet users accused Jacqueline Medina of having invented everything. Tired of being accused of lying, the young woman then shared the article as well as Fox 11’s report on the incident. “I also had to delete the original photo of the gas pump and add the credit to my father’s name, since some people take the photo and tell another anecdote or claim that the syringe contains the AIDS virus (although I don’t ‘ve never said that the syringe contained the virus or not, we do not know what was in it or not) “, she also wrote on social networks.
A psychosis that dates from the late 1990s
As Jacqueline Medina recalls via a link to Snopes fact-checking site, psychosis around syringes supposedly contaminated by the AIDS virus has existed since the end of the 1990s. At that time, emails were circulating reporting alleged contaminations by syringe in telephone booths or cinemas.
The history of gasoline pumps made its appearance in the 2000s. It came back to the fore in 2013, again via Facebook, through a post accusing a group of hiding syringes in Florida gas stations.
HIV, a virus paradoxically very fragile
However, it should be remembered that this information is not very credible given the very nature of the AIDS virus. The latter is indeed a “very fragile virus which does not support being outside the human body”, notes the AIDS info-service site. “It is extremely unlikely that HIV infection will occur as a result of an abandoned needle stick injury in a public place.
However, if the incident occurs with a needle and a syringe containing fresh blood, and if part of the blood is injected, there is theoretically a risk of infection “, specifies the Canadian Pediatric Society. There would be no risk of HIV transmission when the blood is dried.
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