Grievances about hygiene, resources and patient safety at Pakistan’s public hospitals are frequently raised in the pages of local newspapers, but a video of rats scurrying over pipes and beds shared on social media was not filmed in the country as social media posts claim. The clip, whose audio has been removed, previously circulated in posts and news reports about rodent sightings at a medical centre in neighbouring India’s Uttar Pradesh state.
“These rats are present in a government hospital in Quetta, the largest city of Balochistan,” says part of the Urdu-language caption of a Facebook video shared on May 21, 2026.
The video, which has no sound, shows rats clambering across pipes and bed frames as hospital patients rest nearby.
“Even after this video has gone viral, it’s unlikely that our rulers will feel any shame,” the caption adds.
Screenshot of the false post captured on May 22, 2026, with a red X added by AFP
The same video was shared elsewhere in similar posts, including the X account of Pakistani television anchor Mubasher Lucman that also claimed it showed a hospital in Quetta. Other social media posts, meanwhile, claimed it was filmed in Civil Hospital Karachi.
Complaints about public hospitals in Pakistan often grace the pages of local newspapers, with shortages of equipment and staff, hygiene and patient safety recurring concerns (archived here, here and here).
But the clip was not filmed in Pakistan.
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes found the same footage had been shared four months earlier by India’s opposition Congress Party on X (archived link).
“Take a look at the scene from Gonda Medical College in UP,” says part of the Hindi-language post shared on January 14, referring to a health facility in the Indian megastate of Uttar Pradesh.
“Here, in the wards meant for humans, the rats are having a field day. Fat and thin, round and plump… all kinds of rats are scampering here and there.”
Screenshot comparison of the falsely shared video (L) and the Congress Party X post
In the clip, several people can be heard speaking in a mix of Hindi and the northern Bhojpuri language.
“Look, look, there are four, five of them. Don’t get too close,” says one person. Another chimes in: “Make a video of this and give it to the hospital.”
The person recording the video, referring to the state’s chief minister, says, “I will tweet this video tagging Yogi Adityanath, whether he sees it or not.”
A subsequent keyword search on Google led to Indian news reports that said the video was filmed by a patient admitted to the orthopaedic ward of the State Medical College and Babu Ishwar Sharan Hospital in Gonda on January 12 (archived here and here).
Asian News International, an Indian news organisation, also shared a video of hospital superintendent DN Singh saying administrators had been alerted and the incident would be investigated (archived link).
According to the The Daily Pioneer news outlet, a team from the Department of Medical Education visited the college on January 18 after the video spread online (archived link).
District Magistrate Priyanka Niranjan inspected the medical college and directed that outpatient services be shifted to a newly constructed building, according to the report.
AFP has previously debunked other misinformation about healthcare in Pakistan.