Pepsi, Coca Cola & 7Up Contaminated With AIDS Virus?

KUALA LUMPUR – People from around the globe recently was shocked with the claim saying that a few soft drink products such as Pepsi, Coca-Cola, 7-Up, Tropicana Juice Slice etc. were contaminated with HIV virus.

The claim then spread like a bushfire especially in India through social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. This then later lead to people believing the message and they then stopped to drink the soft drinks exactly like how the message had told them to.

According to the message that began to spread on July this year, an employee of the soft drink company had put in a few drops of his blood that contains HIV virus into the drink tank.

“IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM DELHI POLICE…. 4 next NEXT FEW DAY DNT DRINK ANY PRODUCT FROM PEPSI, TROPICANA JUICE SLICE, 7UP, COCA COLA, ETC , AS A WORKER FROM D COMPANY HAS ADDED HIS BLOOD CONTAMINATED WIT AIDS. Watch ND TV.

“Please forward this message to everyone you care for please,” said the message that was taken from Facebook on November 29.

Besides that, the message was also spread through Twitter by irresponsible sides.

“I received a text saying please don’t drink Pepsi a worker put his blood (HIV +) into some bottles. Be careful,” said the message, quoted from the website,urbanlagends.about.com.

However, the claim seemed to be just as same as how it was back in 2004, 2007 and 2008 where people claimed that food products such as ketchup and tomato sauce contain HIV virus.

The website added that when the information were checked by the Center of Disease Control (CDC), all the claims were proven to be false as it is very impossible for HIV virus to be transmitted in such manner.

“HIV does not live long outside the body. Even if small amounts of HIV-infected blood or semen was consumed, exposure to the air, heat from cooking, and stomach acid would destroy the virus. Therefore, there is no risk of contracting HIV from eating food.

According to the report from CDC that was updated in 2010 to now, there has been no reports regarding food products that were contaminated with blood or semen that contain HIV virus and there has been no incidents that involves HIV infections that contracted through food products.