Have you heard the rumours that COVID-19 could turn you into zombies?
Well, me neither. But if someone watches V Wars on Netflix and thought that the drama is a news channel (simi sai right, I know), he might just spread the rumours.
Heck, he even has a footage to show how humans turn into zombies fastly.
A similar incident occurred in Singapore, whereby a rumour surfaced from a misconception, and it could have spread faster because there’s “evidence”.
Yellow HDB Tags Went Viral
After news of a person breaking his Stay-Home Notice (SHN) just to have a hot bowl of Bak Kut Teh surfaced, some of us have begun to wonder if there’s a way to spot anyone who’s on SHN.
And that’s when the fear, which is False Evidence Appearing Real, appears even realer.
An image of someone wearing a yellow tag—kind of like those Armstrong tags we used to be obsessed with—went viral after it was alleged that a person who’s on SHN would be wearing that, and that person is out having a beer at Toa Payoh.
It all happened last Friday (27 March 2020) when Li Zhenqiang was in HDB Centre at Toa Payoh to collect the keys for his resale flat.
Nothing’s wrong with that except that he has to wait for his turn, so he left the premises to for some beer at a nearby coffeeshop.
However, Li had to wear a paper tag to show that he’s already gone through a temperature check and declared his travel status, so that he won’t need to do that again when he re-enter the premises.
But two uncles took the job of citizen journalists too seriously when they took images of Li, and then confronted him.
Despite Li explaining the use of the paper tag, the uncles aren’t having any of it: they posted the image of Li and the paper tag on Facebook, and even said that Li has broken the SHN.
Yes, it’s just like a person posting a footage of V Wars on Facebook and telling others that COVID-19 would turn us into zombies.
It got so bad, HDB has to step in.
Don’t Anyhowly Say, It’s Not SHN
HDB has to posted a Facebook post to inform others that the V-Wars footage is from Netflix the band is indeed used by them to identify people who’ve been screened.
Here’s what they’ve written lest you can’t read it:
We are aware of online discussions regarding people wearing paper wristbands that bear the HDB logo.
As part of our safety measures for visitors entering the HDB Hub for their housing transactions or enquiries, we issue these wristbands to visitors requiring re-entry to our premises. These visitors would have also passed our temperature checks and declared their travel status earlier.
For example, visitors will get the wristband, if they need to return to the car park to get documents for their transactions, or to a food outlet for their meals. Please do not be alarmed if you see the wristbands. They are not an indicator of someone who has been issued with a Stay Home Notice, or a Quarantine Order.
At the same time, we advise our customers to make use of our e-Services on the HDB InfoWEB, or contact us via email or our hotlines for their enquiries: https://hdb.sg/contact, to reduce their time spent in public spaces.
P.S. The paper wristband below is a sample. The colours are changed daily, to prevent visitors from reusing them.
So please, don’t believe everything you see on the Internet.
And if you’re interested to watch V Wars, here’s the trailer: