A Facebook social media account posted a post with the caption "CHINA BANS COCA-COLA FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION AND CLASSIFIES IT AS A CLEANING MATERIAL."
The posted content also continues the claim that China has banned the carbonated drink "Coca-Cola", adding that "In China, Coca-Cola will be sold as a sewer cleaner, and the non-alcoholic drink Coca-Cola produced by the American company Coca-Cola Company according to the decision of the China Central Committee for Economic Development."
After fact-checking conducted by hibrid.info, it has been proven that this claim is not accurate.
Link to the article published by the account "Patriotet E Botes Re":
Hibrid.info, during its internet searches, found that the same claim has also been addressed by foreign fact-checking platforms, such as "thequint.com", where it is shown that the claim is false. (see here)
Such a claim has been found online since 2018 on a Russian website called "Panorama", which at the end of the article wrote - "All texts on this site are grotesque parodies of reality and are not real news", which clarifies that this claim is only a satire and not necessarily something true. (see here)
There is no record of such a claim on the official English-language website of the Chinese State Council either. (see here)
Analyze:
After fact-checking conducted by hibrid.info, it has been confirmed that a Facebook account published an article falsely claiming that China has banned the consumption of the carbonated beverage "Coca-Cola" and that it will only be used as a cleaning material.
After research, it was found that this article has been circulating on the internet since 2018 and was published by a satirical website, indicating that this statement is not true, and such a claim has not been found in any credible source.
Based on its work methodology, hibrid.info assesses this article as "Fake News".
Reasoning:
A “Disinformation” rating is given to media reporting that contains a “mix” of inaccurate sources or even half-truthful content. This rating will also address reports that have incorrect attributions or headlines that do not reflect the text in terms of information accuracy.