Meagan Fitzpatrick, CBC News Posted: Jun 7, 2011 9:14 AM ET
Prime Minister Stephen Harper was not rushed to hospital after "an incident at breakfast" on Tuesday, his office confirmed shortly after a fake news release appeared on the Conservative Party's website.
The front page of the Conservative Party website was hacked Tuesday morning with a fake story that Prime Minister Stephen Harper had been taken to hospital after choking on a hash brown. Dimitri Soudas, Harper's director of communications, told CBC News that the website was hacked and was quickly fixed. But the story posted under the news release section of the website quickly had Ottawa buzzing and people talking about it on the website Twitter. The fake news release said Harper choked on a hash brown while eating breakfast with his kids, "blocking air from reaching his lungs," and that his wife, Laureen, called 911. It said a member of his security team administered first aid and that the prime minister was airlifted to a hospital in Toronto. "Due to the nature of the incident, we are cautiously assuming the Prime minister will completely recover within the next few days. From the looks of things, Harper will miss many of his planned meetings over the next few days," the fake news release said.The text and nature of the press release immediately caused suspicion but some news outlets reported the story. "Clearly somebody hacked our website," Soudas said. "The prime minister actually took his daughter to school this morning," Soudas said Harper is fine and is in Ottawa Tuesday morning.
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