Fact Check: Did a Delhi-based doctor die because of coronavirus?

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in a lot of panic and fear in the minds of people. This has also brought forward many rumours circulating on various social media portals, and thus the exchange of fake news has been spreading like wildfire. A recent rumour that is being shared by people on social media is that a doctor named Usman Riaz has passed away due to coronavirus. 

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Claim:

A Facebook post shared by a user had with a picture of somebody who is supposedly Doctor Usman Riaz. The post speaks of how Usman Riaz got the virus himself after tending to patients. People have commented on the post and offered their condolences. They also prayed to God for him. Here is the post:

Source: Facebook

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Source: Twitter

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Rating: Fake

The post that claims that a certain Doctor Usman Riaz passed away in Delhi. The picture of Usman Riaz as given in the post shows that he is wearing a coat of a hospital named Aster Medical Centre. Aster Medical Center is a hospital in Al Karama, Dubai. A site shows that the hospital has a doctor named Dr Riyaz Usman, who is a general practitioner. The picture is the same as the viral photo. This means that the viral post is fake.

Dr Usman Riaz gets confused with Dr Riyaz Usman

Source: Healthigo

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Origin:

The post that spoke of passing away of a Delhi doctor from coronavirus started spreading on Facebook, Twitter as well as Whatsapp. Doctor Riyaz Usman from Dubai became the face of this rumour, which shows that the entire claim is fake. A little digging through Twitter shows that there was a Pakistani Doctor named Dr Osama Riaz who lost his life in Karachi. He was responsible for screening pilgrims who had returned to Pakistan from Iran, as per an article in a leading daily.

The confusion arose as the spread of rumours slowly led to the spelling of the name being changed. While the official sites name the Pakistani doctor as Dr Osama Riaz, the name used by Twitterati was Dr Usman Riaz. Here is one such tweet:

Source: Twitter

Dubai's Dr Riyaz Usman, as per healthigo.com, has completed his studies in India. He did his MBBS from Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, Bangalore and post-graduation from Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, Kerala, working here as a specialist later. He has been working in Al Kamara in Dubai since July 2016. 

Google Trends Analytics

The Google Trends analytics of this rumour shows that the search for Doctor Usman Riaz reached its peak on March 27 at 12.30 AM, after the searches are done on March 26 at 12.30 noon. The searches went down, experiencing a small increase again at 1.30 AM on March 28. Here are the results of the searches related to this post.

Source: Google Trends

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