Medical News Blog Information

Fake/wrong Ebola virus disease images...

As if there isn't enough misery in the world that we need add false imagery to the mix.

Fake or hoax or just plain misunderstood images purporting to be from cases of Ebola virus disease are everywhere at the moment. The ones below are images I see regularly in the #ebola Twitter stream. 

I had once before found the real image of the first picture using a reveres image searhc on Tineye or Google's image search, but lost it until I recently downloaded my Twitter history and did a manual search for the words I thought I'd used. Bazinga! 

I'll add to this page as I find references for other fraudulent imagery. Feel free to send me other fake Ebola-related images (with the original source) and please use this page to throw at people using these images.

While I suspect much of this is just retweteed out of a lack of information, I'd ask that people check before they propagate this sort of stuff. It may dissuade others in the affected regions from seeking medical attention if they think they have been exposed because "If I don't look like that then I can't have an Ebola virus infection!"


NOT EBOLA VIRUS DISEASE
Figure 1. This is from a patient with which has haemorrhagic
bullae simulating purpura fulminans...whopping great blood
blisters and tissues that have been bled into. Image comes
from a case of leukaemia cutis published in the Indian Journal
of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology in 2010 by
Misri and colleagues
.
Pubmed


NOT EBOLA VIRUS DISEASE
Figure 2. This is from a boy with smallpox disease. It can be found 

NOT EBOLA VIRUS DISEASE
Large hemorrhage on arm of dengue patient
Figure 3. This is bleeding under the skin in a patient with dengue
hemorrhagic fever. The image can be found on the National Institute
of Health's National Institute (NIH) of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases (NIAID) website
.
NOT EBOLA VIRUS DISEASE
Figure 4. This may be an allergic reaction, possibly 
to contact with poison ivy. I'm not as sure about the source
of this one. Some possible places include:
http://poison-ivy.org/
http://gloriousconfusion.squidoo.com/poisonous_plants_lily_of_valley_ivy_foxglove_digitalis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_dermatitis
http://hardinmd.lib.uiowa.edu/dermnet/poisonivy1.html

UNSURE


Figure 5. I can only find ebolavirus-related results for this. 
If anyone can confirm or debunk it as being a valid EVD image, I'd 
be grateful if you could tell me.

Like Us

Blog Archive