How to protect yourself from false health information spreading online

Chloe Kizito says she sees some video touting health and science misinformation every time she checks her social feeds.

Kizito, 16, is a fact checker and youth journalist with MediaSmarts, who produces videos to show teens how to determine whether what they see online has evidence to back it up.

"I see at least one video online that's saying like, 'Oh, this can cure this.' Or 'Did you know that by doing this, you're going to get this disease or this illness?" the resident of Kitchener, Ont., said.

Kizito said she's noticed more health misinformation in the last year as deepfakes and AI become prominent on social media. The fakes often use the image of someone famous to generate content that makes it seem like a celebrity or politician is saying something when they're really not.

On Wednesday, the Canadian Medical Association, as well as provincial and territorial medical groups and other experts, decried how false health information is "increasingly shaping public discourse, public beliefs, and policy actions."

Part of the fallout, Canadian doctors say, is seeing patients unwilling to accept proven treatments and suffer consequences, even death.

Tim Caulfield, a law professor in the School of Public Health at the University of Alberta and signatory to the CMA statement, said social media influencers and podcasters have played a huge role in disseminating health misinformation in the last couple of years.

"I think the fundamental shift is that all of these topics have become political," Caulfield said.

"They've become part of the story that particular political communities sell and believe. Once it becomes about people's identity, it becomes much more difficult to change people's minds. We're absolutely seeing that, especially in the United States, but increasingly in Canada."

Caulfield said while it may sound like hyperbole to say misinformation kills, it's true that increased vaccine hesitancy leads to children dying from vaccine-preventable diseases like measles. Financial exploitation that results in people spending money on unproven supplements is also a harm, he said.

Dr. Joseph Dahine, an intensive care physician in Laval, Que., posts on TikTok to fight misinformation about COVID-19 and other illnesses. Dahine recalled a COVID patient in 2021 who needed to be intubated after supplemental oxygen in hospital wasn't enough. The man didn't believe COVID existed.

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"We spent the longest time trying to convince him that we're just here to provide help. He ended up changing his mind, but it was too late by then and unfortunately he passed away," Dahine recalled.

"I think this story is the pinnacle of what misinformation can do."

Dahine said he's seen other misinformation harms, ranging from young people with cancer seeking natural treatments, or ignoring symptoms of metastatic breast cancer that became incurable.

Dr. Margot Burnell, CMA's president and an oncologist, said she sees two solutions. The first is to improve primary care, with more access to family doctors and nurse practitioners, so people can get their medical advice from a medical practitioner.

The second is to present patients with the scientific facts about their treatment with compassion and concern so they have information to decide.

"We need to increase access to primary care because people are seeking their advice [on social media] when they can't get into their medical practitioner," or they don't have one.

"If they feel very unwell then they should go to an emergency department and after hours clinic and not seek attention from being online."

Dahine, who was not part of the statement, joined the CMA in calling for better access to doctors.

"If it's two in the morning and you're worried about something, Google should not be the first, you know, reflex," adding that's also the case for TikTok, Twitter or Facebook. "It should be someone with the credentials to help you."

Unlike influencers, Dahine said doctors like him who inform and educate online, aren't trying to sell hormones, supplements or a master class.

Contrary to popular misinformation, CMA's statement points to the body of evidence showing that vaccines do not cause or increase the risk for autism; ivermectin is not an effective treatment for COVID, cancer or autism; and COVID vaccines are safe and effective.

Caulfield recommends telling people about what kind of misinformation they might see, debunking and correcting misinformation, teaching critical thinking skills and media literacy, including the importance of scientific consensus. He reminds people to pause before they share.

"Those strategies, when done together, can make a real difference even in our polarized environment," he said.

For her part, Kizito said when her own friends send her videos wanting her to join them in eating or avoiding a particular food, she said she tries not to dismiss them.

MediaSmarts, Canada's Centre for Digital Media Literacy, recommends these basic steps to recognize misinformation:

• Use fact-checking tools like Snopes.com to see if the story has been debunked.

• If a post references a news story or headline, find the original media source.

• Look up the source on Google or Wikipedia to check whether it has a good track record or is known for misinformation.

• Check whether other sources like news outlets are reporting the same story.

"I ask them, OK, who posted this content, find the original source and then we go on from there," Kizito said.