A video has gone viral on the internet in the past few days in which a man was seen smoking a cigarette while inside a body bag. The clip was shared alongside a message that claimed the coronavirus pandemic to be a hoax.
In the video, a white caucasuian male pulled his head out to take a few drags while remaining alongside several other body bags which were fully covered. Two men were seen sitting on top of the bags which were put in what looked like a truck, the video showed.
Those who shared the video claimed that the video was shot during the Covid pandemic. It was by using manipulative visuals like these that the governments managed to make the public believe that the virus claimed a large number of lives, they said.
"Never forget what our so called “Leaders” did to us …. Call it what you like it amounts to Psychological Abuse
During Covid - Legacy Media regularly wheeled out the body bags, giving the illusion of mass deaths from a deadly virus Of course it was all a Lie. Sometimes Crisis actors with a Nicotine addiction got so bored pretend waiting to Die, they simply had to light up there & then," the virally reshared title of the video claimed.
So what is the truth behind the living corpse being used by the rumour peddlers? Was it, after all, shot during the pandemic years? We checked:
OSINT probe
When a screengrab of the smoking man's head was reverse searched on Google, the "Exact matches" window retrieved a post on X (formerly Twitter) from March 2021. A handle called HoaxEye had posted the image as a reply to a post.
.jpg "Smiking dead man covid fact check: We found that the video is doing rounds with similar claims since 2021")
We found that the video is doing rounds with similar claims since 2021
"Found the source. It's from a making-of video clip: https://instagram.com/stories/highlights/18040163887300722/ by kirill.groshev. They were making a music video "Never-Ever" by rapper Husky," the image, which was the screenshot of an Instagram story, was titled.
.jpg "fact check covid fake deaths (1)")
This established that the claim connecting the video to the pandemic is not new but doing rounds on the internet since the outbreak.
Following the clue, we searched ""Never-Ever" by rapper Husky" on YouTube. The top result was a Russian video uploaded on the channel 'Husky" on September 26, 2020. At timeframe 2:20, we noted a scene in the music video that showed a mini-truck being used to transport a lot of dead bodies. The body bags seen in the viral video looked similar to those used in this scene. The wall of the building seen in the background of both scenes was also similar, we noticed.
.jpg "Smiking dead man covid fact check: We found that the video is doing rounds with similar claims since 2021")
Marked in red: the similar-looking walls; marked in green: the trucks | Videograbs
"Director | author of the idea: Evgeniy Bakirov /realbakirov Director of photography – Kirill Groshev Production designer – Vasya Ivanov Production...," the English translation of the Russian video read. The full video can be seen below.
When we searched for Kirill Groshev on Instagram, we found a handle with 10K followers. "Berlin based Cinematographer", the account bio read.
.jpg "fact check covid fake deaths (3)")
This confirmed that it is a clip from the shooting location of a Russian music video that is being virally used to promote a baseless coronavirus conspiracy theory.
FACT CHECK
Claim: People pretending to be dead during Covid pandemic as asked by the govt
Verdict: Not True
Fact: The footage was taken during the shooting of a Russian music video that was released in 2020. It is unrelated to the coronavirus pandemic.
