Is an infodemic the biggest threat to global health?
Kris Sterkens
Company Group Chairman - Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine (EMEA) and Managing Director - J&J Innovative Medicine Campus Belgium
In the age of technology and social media, fake news isn’t the only thing we’re fighting.
The Covid-19 crisis brought up a seemingly infinite supply of misinformation that filtered into everything we read and heard.
The pandemic created an ‘infodemic:’ a term coined by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO. In June this year, the WHO began a formal global conversation on how to manage infodemics with its first ‘infodemiology’ conference that brought together both politicians and scientists to explore solutions to the problem.
For us in the health industry, the infodemic was, and still is, more than just unsettling and worrying. It undermines the science we exist to uphold. However, we can use the same technology and social media that spreads misinformation to educate and spread science and truth. In fact, the pharma industry has huge potential to build the bridge between the right, evidence-based information and the people who want and need to hear it.
In the quest for scientific truth, public health education and trust, is it time for us – the pharmaceutical industry – to look beyond our traditional role as drug-makers?
The side-effects of an infodemic
The side effects of an infodemic are grave. Spreading misinformation and rumors during a health emergency makes it difficult to identify a solution, and the huge volume of unverified information can make it hard for people to weed out the truth. This hampers an effective public health response.
Misinformation negatively impacts people’s health and divides us as a society and acting on the wrong information can cause serious harm. We probably all know someone – a family member or friend – who made a health decision during the pandemic based on misinformation. According to the WHO , in the first three months of 2020, nearly 6,000 people around the globe were hospitalized because of Covid-19 misinformation. Tragically up to 800 of those may have died.
Mental health can suffer too: information from multiple conflicting sources confuses people and leads to more stress and anxiety in a time of crisis. A study looking at over 80 million Twitter posts showed that users who shared Covid-19 misinformation experienced double the amount of anxiety compared to similar users who did not share misinformation.1 This puts the mental health costs of an infodemic into stark reality.
Health literacy: The antidote to misinformation
The WHO defines health literacy as 'the personal characteristics and social resources needed for individuals and communities to access, understand, appraise and use information and services to make decisions about health.’2 In layman’s terms, health literacy is a person's ability to understand and use information to make decisions about their health. If you have a disability, for example, you might have trouble accessing health information. Or if you’re facing financial hardship, you may not have the resources to access it.
Access is the most crucial part of health literacy because if a person doesn’t have access to health information, it goes without saying that they can’t understand, appraise or use it.
Technology – and social media platforms in particular – have tremendous power to boost access to health information all over the world. While they play a huge role in facilitating the dissemination of misinformation, they are equally powerful tools in helping people to break down the usual barriers to accessing health information. They empower anyone with a phone, or an internet connection, to seek out information and educate themselves – no matter where they are.
Using social media to strengthen pandemic response
Research has shown that social media can help people to find, process and understand health information.3 Viral social marketing (a style of promotion that relies on an audience to spread the word to their contacts about a message, service or product) can make the difference between a successful health education, promotion or outreach programme and a failed one.
On social media platforms, people can engage quickly and deeply with other people like them, anywhere in the world, as well as institutions and businesses who can give them the information they’re looking for. Eight out of 10 people now search for health information online, and that’s not just young people. Ninety-six percent of people between the ages of 30 and 49, and 80% of people between 50 and 64 go online for health information.?
Health literacy keeps people safe, educated, and confident in science. Combining the power of health literacy and technology could be our greatest tool in fighting this infodemic, and any others that come after it.
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We know from the results of a survey that the WHO collaborated on – covering 23,500 people between the ages of 18 and 40, in 24 countries across five continents – that young people see science content as shareworthy. Almost half of them (43.9%) said they would share ‘scientific’ content on social media.?
Pandemic misinformation may have spread like wildfire over social media, but this finding proves that good news and true information can go viral in the same way that bad news and misinformation does. Disseminating good information in our digitized world can lead to positive outcomes.
An industry-wide effort
To counter future infodemics, we must work better, together. Raising global health literacy is a big job, but a vital one.
It’s one of the most important tasks our industry faces. To get it right, we need to collaborate to better understand health literacy issues barriers and support each other to harness the power of technology and social media.
Unfortunately, misinformation is here to stay. We can’t erase it because we can’t get around the very human pull to bad and shocking news, or for simple answers to complex questions. We can redress the balance, though: by spreading truth using the same systems, tools and technology.
It’s an exciting time in the pharma industry. We’re at a turning point. The Covid-19 response saw pharma step out and into the public arena – helping to support and solve not just a healthcare challenge, but a socio-economic one too. More infodemics are sure to come. To be ready for them, we must step out of our comfort zone and transform. We must expand our traditional role as a treatment business and step up as a public educator and disseminator of health information.?
The pharma industry has huge potential to build the bridge between the right, evidence-based information and the people who want and need to hear it. We’ve already started to move in this direction: there are many examples of pharma companies supporting communities and health care systems to break down barriers to access to care, educating people about health risk factors or offering wellness and disease prevention programs. For instance, through the Global Community Impact (GCI) organization, Johnson & Johnson builds community-driven solutions to improve global human health. One program – ‘Talent for Good’ – gives our people the opportunity to work with health NGOs in developing countries to share their skills and set up education programs with local communities.?
When we look back on our sector a few decades from now, we will see that the pharmaceutical companies who broadened out from their traditional business model into health education and dissemination were the ones that succeeded in their mission to improve global health.
With the right technological expertise, collaboration, commitment, and resources, we can raise health literacy around the world and fight future infodemics.
References
1.??????The WHO: Fighting misinformation one step at a time. Available at: Fighting misinformation in the time of COVID-19, one click at a time (who.int) . Accessed 8 June 2022
2.??????Scientific Reports: Examining the impact of sharing Covid-19 misinformation online on mental health. Available at: Examining the impact of sharing COVID-19 misinformation online on mental health | Scientific Reports (nature.com) . Accessed 8 June 2022
3.??????The WHO: Improving health literacy. Available at: Improving health literacy (who.int) . Accessed 8 June 2022
4.??????Pew Research Center: The Social Life of Health Information. Available at: The Social Life of Health Information | Pew Research Center . Accessed 8 June 2022
5.??????The WHO: Social Media & Covid-19: A global study of digital crisis interaction among Gen Z. Available at: Social media & COVID-19: A global study of digital crisis interaction among Gen Z and Millennials (who.int) . Accessed 8 June 2022
6.??????Johnson & Johnson: Global Talent for Good. Available at: https://www.jnj.com/global-community-impact/engaging-employees-with-company-purpose . Accessed 8 June 2022
Noisy introvert. Chief Executive at Impatient Health
2 年"Is it time for us – the pharmaceutical industry – to look beyond our traditional role as drug-makers?" It was that time a long time ago. If you care about outcomes then there can be no further argument. The problem is that simply fighting misinformation with accurate information doesn't work, for many reasons, such as the fact that we appear self-serving, that our need to comply with regulation also makes us look bland, or we simply can't respond to some claims. Whereas those spreading false information can say anything and use any trick in the book to boost engagement. The key here is the channel. Though you say we can use the same tools in response, that's not strictly true. A 50:50 facebook debate is likely to be a race to the bottom. Worse, most pharma companies took a step backwards during the pandemic by trying to create their own branded experiences (websites, apps) that by default are not independent and thus not trustworthy. We need to adopt different, unaffiliated channels and talk a different language, perhaps by speaking through others. Dr Priya Agrawal MD MPH
Executive Director
2 年Couldnt agree more !
Managing Director (SVP), Mid-Sized Markets EMEA
2 年It’s an important responsibility as we head down that path of transformation you talk about, Kris. The Covid-19 infodemic was damaging, and it showed us where and how we need to be stepping up to a much wider role as an educator and source of reliable health information.
Victory Mindset Coach | Bestselling Author | Mentor
2 年Completely agree
Strategic Senior Consultant Health and Sustainability Policies and Communication
2 年I fully agree. ECDC has just delivered a new training course which will help public health experts and risk communicators across Europe to address misinformation on vaccines. Pre- and debunking of misinformation are two techniques taught in this course. And increasing the health literacy of people is one of the main long-term investments we have to make as a society. Our company Schuttelaar & Partners is proud to have steered this project of researchers and communication professionals together with ECDC. https://lnkd.in/edFWWw_W