The Threat of Misinformation on Public Health

In this Pharmaceutical Executive video interview, Jen Butler, Chief Commercial Officer for Pleio, discussed the significant threat of misinformation to public health, citing a 2021 report by former Surgeon General Murthy. She highlighted that 70% of false news is shared more often than true news due to its emotional appeal. Butler emphasized the importance of verifying health information by directly contacting trusted sources like Cleveland Clinic, Mayo Clinic, and Kaiser Permanente. She also noted the role of pharma in supporting patient communities and the need for media and health literacy. Butler also suggested that peer-to-patient platforms can enhance patient engagement and adherence, particularly for chronic conditions.

What kind of threat is misinformation to public health?

I have to say, nowadays, it's a huge threat. Back in 2021, former Surgeon General Murthy published a report about confronting health misinformation, and this was four years ago. He acknowledged at that point, and this was coming off of COVID and the pandemic, and the role of misinformation and causing confusion and anxiety and growing mistrust with patients and the population, and the impact that that can have over public health efforts. He raised concern in this report about the changing information environment, and at the time, four years ago, he was really focusing on the social media outlets that we have in place, and the fact that engaging content isn't always it. I should say engaging content is really emotionally driven, and therefore there's opinions behind it. In this report, there is a reference to a study that 70% of false news is shared more often than true news because it has that appeal. And while this is not about fake news, I think that can lend itself to health information also, because it's really important for patients when they're feeling vulnerable to be able to find information and not question. And as you're questioning information, you start to get more anxious and overwhelmed about what's coming next.

Fast forward from where we were four years ago to today with the impact and prevalence of TikTok and AI and we've just ignited where former Surgeon General Murthy was starting with his view of this, of this surge of misinformation for patients. It's really tricky. It's too easy for patients to go into their feeds and start finding patients like them in their feeds or hearing influencers. And no matter what you Google or search for in these in the in these forums, you're going to find opinions, and that it's the tricky part is, it's comforting. It's comforting to see patients like yourself offering opinions. And I think there is a great wealth of awareness that can be raised, but information and validated information can't be trusted upon opinions, and I think that's where it's a slippery slope.

When you add in TikTok and AI — and AI again, shows amazing opportunity for information collection, information seekers, but we know that AI also has quote, unquote hallucinations that you don't know what information you're getting back is credible. So, it's wonderful to have access to all this information. I mean, at least patients aren't in the dark like we were maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago, but we also have to make sure that we know how to handle the information that's coming our way and be able to separate fact from opinion.