(KGTV) — An image going around social media appears to show a panel from a 1957 comic strip of The Phantom in which the main character encourages a native to wear a face mask to protect from the "China Virus."
But it is fake.
In the real comic, The Phantom is encouraging people to wear a mask to protect themselves against Sleep Death, a mysterious illness plaguing people in the fictitious Tessai Valley.
The strip was published during the 1957 flu pandemic to encourage the public to wear masks to prevent the spread of the disease.
The verbiage about the “China Virus” was a digital creation.
