Truth or Hype? How to Spot Health Misinformation

Keeping up with health info is critical, especially when you have a chronic illness — but fake and fishy stories, ads, and recommendations are everywhere. Here’s how to suss out the truth.

A recent viral story on TikTok insisted that raw potato juice can cure throat infections. Another claimed that beer can help you get a better tan.

True? No. But they’re tempting to believe.

Misformation like this has clout on social media, spreading further and faster than fact-checked information. Attention-grabbing headlines are often easier to understand than evidence-based studies, and many of them make claims about miraculously healing serious illnesses.

But there are ways to protect yourself against medical misinformation. You can develop a spidey sense for detecting health claims that just don’t pass muster. Read on to learn how.

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Strident alarms drown out nuanced voices

“The nuanced voices of scientists often do not resonate with the public as much as the strident alarms sounded by people of fame speaking in absolute terms,” write the authors of an editorial in the journal Circulation.

With social media, these “alarms” are increasingly common.

“False health claims come in all shapes and sizes,” said ​​Kristen Panthagani, an emergency medicine physician and author of the medical blog about science in a world of untrue facts. “The most common ones I see are false rumors about vaccine safety, promotion of the ‘health benefits’ of supplements that have never actually been verified, and … promising to diagnose the cause of vague, complex symptoms, like fatigue.”

These claims may live on social media, but they affect people in the real world. Those seeking relief from symptoms like fatigue and pain are particularly susceptible.

Medical mistrust and dangerous health consequences

Exposure to health misinformation while scrolling Facebook, TikTok, or other social platforms can also lead to mistrust in doctors and research-backed medical treatments.

For instance, a recent TikTok trend encouraged people to drink the mineral borax, often used as a laundry detergent, with their morning coffee. When a woman diagnosed with a painful spinal condition gave the drink a try, she ended up vomiting and developing a severe headache.

In another example, a woman says she went to the hospital with a burnt esophagus after trying a TikTok influencer’s advice to eat an unpeeled orange coated with cinnamon and cayenne pepper. The influencer apparently claimed to have healed her body from a chronic illness.

“Misleading health information can lead people to make dangerous decisions about their own health and well-being,” said Irving Washington, senior vice president and executive director of the Health Misinformation and Trust Initiative at KFF, a nonprofit health policy research, polling, and news organization.

“This affects them individually and, at the broader level, public health,” Washington said, pointing out that false claims around COVID-19 vaccination led to vaccine hesitancy.

Of course, some complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies can be helpful alongside conventional medical treatments. However, using them instead of conventional treatments can lead to disastrous results.

Research from 2017 found that people with cancer had a greater risk of death when they refused conventional cancer therapies, including radiotherapy and chemotherapy, in favor of CAM.

“Both natural and human-made products need to be tested to see if they are helpful,” explains Panthagani. “We can’t just assume something works because it was extracted from a plant.”

The art of fact twisting

Plenty of health claims making the rounds on social media aren’t backed by science, such as:

• sunscreen causes cancer
• raw milk is better for you than pasteurized milk (even amid bird flu outbreaks)
• there are “miracle” cures for cancer, like cannabis oil

The list goes on.

In a 2021 study, cancer experts looked for health misinformation in 200 of the most popular articles on social media about the four most common types of cancer. As reviewers defined it, a whopping third of the articles contained misinformation, and about a third of that was harmful information.

What do they have in common? It can be hard to put your finger on. Here are just some of their wily ways.

Identifying red flags in health content

How can you find trustworthy sources when researching a health claim?

One way is to determine the “why” behind the claim.

For instance, is the person making the claim selling something or trying to promote themselves? Are they trying to persuade their audience to believe something? Or is their main intention to inform without an agenda?

Look for the answers to these questions to train your spidey sense to pick up on bogus health claims.

According to Megan Soliman, a board certified internal medicine physician, there are several things to look out for when determining whether a source or claim is trustworthy.

Something to note: Using government websites from other countries can be OK — like Canada, the UK, and Australia. However, some drugs are approved in other countries but not in the United States, and some medical terminology is different.

Another thing to keep in mind when googling: with search engine results, don’t automatically trust what appears first. Google isn’t vetting credibility for you.

“Just because it’s the first thing you see at the top [of search engine results] doesn’t mean it’s good. It doesn’t mean it’s the most evidence-based,” says Soliman. “A lot of times, you need to go to the bottom, or the next page.”

Washington recommends verifying the information you found by looking it up in a trusted source — or two.

Getting your information from multiple sources helps prevent echo chambers where the same ideas are shared and amplified. It can also help you identify whether a claim or entire source is false or deceptive.

The CRAAP test: A quick way to screen your sources

The CRAAP test was developed by librarians at California State University’s Meriam Library to evaluate the quality of information in any kind of media, including books, articles, and websites.

The memorable acronym stands for:

• Current: How up-to-date is this source?
• Relevant: Is this information relevant to your question?
• Authoritative: Is this from a trusted source or author?
• Accurate: Can this information be verified? Has it been vetted by experts?
• Purpose: Was this source created to inform, persuade, or sell?

If its purpose was to sell something or persuade, it may be less trustworthy than a source created to inform. Do the claims seem objective or biased?

Our list of trusted sources by condition

Our medical experts and editorial team have vetted these sources. Visit them to find trusted information on your condition and investigate health claims you’re skeptical about.

How to be an empowered consumer of health information

Learning how to analyze health information takes time, and that’s OK.

Washington recommends checking facts you hear and assessing whether the messenger has motivations that might bias the information. This will help sharpen your spidey sense for false or misleading information.

When it comes to your health, Soliman recommends telling your doctor about everything. That includes supplements, teas, vitamins, and any complementary and alternative medicine treatments you use.

Healthcare professionals sometimes don’t have enough time during an appointment to ask all the questions necessary to determine your needs. Make sure you take a proactive approach and come to each appointment prepared.

You can do your part to stop the spread of health misinformation by learning how to identify it and talking with family, friends, and members of your community about the problem of health misinformation.

And it goes without saying, do all you can to avoid sharing health misinformation — via social media or any other way. Ask your doctor if you’re in doubt about information you find online relating to your health.