Rumours are circulating that claim products at popular supermarket Tesco’s have been infected with the Ebola virus.
The rumours seem to have been started by a website known as The Daily Bale. The “Bale” part stands for Brits Against Left Wing Extremism. They have featured on our site before for starting a false rumour that a pub in Leicester were refusing to serve British soldiers – a stunt that landed the site owner Josh Bonehill in trouble with the police, according to reports.
The Daily Bale has been responsible for a number of rumours, mostly race related hoaxes aimed at targeting ethnic minorities. This latest article they published speculates on the possibility that goods imported to Tesco stores in the UK could contain the Ebola virus, which has since spawned a rumour that Tesco’s produce has been infected.
However upon reading The Daily Bale article that started this rumour, it becomes apparent that it is just a needless alarmist piece that does not appear to be based on any factual information or with any knowledge of how Tesco import their goods nor the health & safety procedures in place to ensure their products are safe for consumption.
The article also appears ignorant to key facts about Ebola itself, such as it is not easily transmitted and is mostly spread through direct human contact from person to person (since the virus is transmitted via bodily fluids from an infected person who is already showing symptoms.) There is no evidence to show that the current Ebola outbreak is being spread through goods such as fruit and vegetables.
In fact it is even unclear why the article is targeting Tesco, since most supermarkets import specific goods from around the world.
Tesco’s have responded to the rumours via their Twitter feed, stating –
This rumour seems to have been started by a website with a history of posting utter nonsense, written by a person who seems intent on spreading misinformation and alarmist lies across the Internet. None of the article is based on factual information, only baseless and uneducated speculation and thus should be dismissed as nonsense.