Media with egg on its face after blaming Trump for man dying from ingesting chloroquine fish tank cleaner

Yesterday the media reported a story about a man dying from chloroquine and blamed it on Trump:

Those are just a few examples from Twitchy.

CNN even took it to air…

Drudge also ran with this story with the headline “Man dies after taking chloroquine…”

But this is incredibly misleading! The man and his wife ingested a cleaner for their aquarium that happens to have chloroquine in it. It’s called chloroquine phosphate. The Reuters article that Drudge linked to at least had the details in the story even though they still indirectly blamed Trump…

An Arizona man has died and his wife is in critical condition after they ingested chloroquine phosphate – an aquarium cleaning product similar to drugs that have been named by President Trump as potential treatments for coronavirus infection.

The couple, in their 60s, experienced immediate distress after swallowing the drug, an additive used at aquariums to clean fish tanks, according to Banner Health Hospital in Phoenix.

Chloroquine phosphate shares the same active ingredient as malaria drugs that President Trump has touted as possibly effective against COVID-19, the potentially life-threatening disease caused by the coronavirus.

On Saturday, Trump tweeted about the combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin, saying it had “a real chance to be one of the biggest game changers in the history of medicine.”

The nation’s top infectious disease expert, Anthony Fauci, played down that claim, saying the therapy must be tested to assure its safety and efficacy.

These two things have nothing to do with each other. Trump has NEVER advocated ingesting a fish tank cleaner at all. It’s patently absurd to lead people to believe this has anything to do with the president.

Axios, who also ran the story, has now deleted their tweet and corrected their story:

I don’t understand how they could have gotten this so wrong in the first place. It’s a fish tank cleaner. This is not hard. It’s as if the media are so zealous to blame Trump for the coronavirus that they aren’t even paying attention to the details of a story. They just run with it. Either that or they hope that people will just read the headlines and blame Trump. Either way it’s completely irresponsible.

Axios has deleted their tweet and corrected their story. Who is next?


Comment Policy: Please read our comment policy before making a comment. In short, please be respectful of others and do not engage in personal attacks. Otherwise we will revoke your comment privileges.