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Mukudzei Chingwere Midlands Bureau
People should not abuse social media by circulating sensitive and false information pertaining to health issues, public relations officer with the Ministry of Health and Child Care, Mr Donald Mujiri has said.

Patients on Anti Retroviral Drugs (ART) were thrown into panic mode when false information was circulated on social media recently to the effect that the country was hit by drug shortages due to shortage of foreign currency. The unsubstantiated reports also suggested that private pharmacies were now taking advantage of the ‘‘shortages’’ to inflate drug prices.

“Health issues are a matter of life and death. People should stop making reckless statements and start circulating unsubstantiated statements on health issues,” said Mr Mujiri.

Mr Mujiri said every organisation had channels of communication, adding that the general public should ignore information that comes from unknown sources.

“Even the Minister (of Health and Child Care) does not just make statements out of nowhere, he gathers information from our focal persons. We have provincial heads, hospital CEOs and medical superintendents who assist us with statistics and the state of health delivery system to give us accurate details,” he said.