Infodemic is a term used by WHO to describe the overwhelming amount of information, including mis- and disinformation during health emergencies.
However, the digital information environment affects many areas of health outside emergencies as well.
Typically in health systems, the emergency staff don’t talk to those working in routine health programs. This is why if you want to build partnerships in addressing health misinformation and related information challenges, you need to work across the health system, and go deeper than just speaking to communications people in the organization.
Both public health professionals and fact-checkers make assumptions about what the other can do and what the other expects when addressing health misinformation. A public health professional might assume that a fact-checking organization can only create debunks. A fact-checker may assume that public health people only care about communications or quantifying pieces of misinformation. We know that both groups are capable of much more, using an extended set of strategies in ways of collaboration to address and prevent health mis- and disinformation affecting people’s health.
This is why fact-checkers should be prepared to educate public health colleagues, and fact-checking organizations will have a learning curve working with health organizations.
See next article: 2/ Harmful narratives are found in many areas of health
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