Posts share fabricated Chinese news report to push false 'toxic toothpaste' claim
- Published on December 14, 2024 at 03:06
- 4 min read
- By Rachel CHAN, AFP Hong Kong
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"CCTV reported on deadly toxic toothpaste, long term use is equivalent to suicide. Here comes the toothpaste rush again!" read the simplified-Chinese caption to an image shared on X on December 2, 2024.
"Toothpaste in China was spot checked, only the following six brands out of a hundred passed the test," adds text superimposed on the image.
The image, which was viewed more than 1.1 million times, appears to show a screenshot of a news segment aired by state broadcaster CCTV at 7:30 pm on November 21.
The chyron at the bottom of the purported screenshot reads, "CCTV reported on deadly toxic toothpaste!", and claims concentrations of formaldehyde exceeded safety standards by 20 times.
The six brands of toothpaste that supposedly met the regulations are also listed in a table under the heading, "2024 Toothpaste Ingredient and Efficacy Sampling and Evaluation Report".
The same image was shared elsewhere on X and Threads, while a similar image was posted on Instagram.
Fears about product safety are widespread in China, with the biggest scandals in recent years affecting food and medicine (archived links here and here).
The latest example of perceived lax oversight saw major sanitary pad manufacturers forced to apologise after being accused of selling pads that were shorter than advertised, the BBC reported in November (archived link).
The image circulating on social media, however, is not a screenshot from a genuine CCTV news report.
'False and inaccurate'
A keyword search on Google led to a notice posted on the official website of the China Oral Care Industry Association on November 30 that refuted the claim (archived link).
"Such information is all false and inaccurate," it said.
Subsequent keyword searches on Google led to China's 2023 National Cosmetics Supervision and Inspection Annual Report, produced by the National Medical Products Administration on September 10 (archived link).
Toothpaste is one of 12 cosmetic products that are tested for quality and safety.
The report stated that 20,936 batches of cosmetic products were sampled from all that sold in the country, and were tested in accordance with the Technical Specification for the Safety of Cosmetics (Edition 2015), which ensures the quality and safety of cosmetic products.
Among the 12 types of cosmetics sampled, the proportion of batches that met the regulations in the toothpaste category reached 98.7 percent.
As of December 12, there have been no official reports on CCTV about toothpaste failing to meet the safety standards.
A search of CCTV programming found the only news programmes aired by the broadcaster at 7:30 pm on November 21 were the daily news show Xinwen Lianbo and Asia Today (archived link).
The screenshot shared in the false posts, however, does not match these programmes.
Below is a screenshot comparison between the image in the false posts (left) and the Xinwen Lianbo host on November 21 (right):
The anchor in the falsely shared image is Zhang Tao, who hosts CCTV's Live News and Midnight News programmes, neither of which are broadcast at 7:30 pm (archived link).
A review of those programmes also shows Zhang did not host either on November 21.
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