Canadian Medical Association Sounds Alarm on Health Misinformation Crisis

Chloe Kizito can’t scroll through her social media feeds without encountering dubious health claims. The 16-year-old fact-checker from Kitchener, Ontario, who works with MediaSmarts producing educational videos for teens, says the problem has worsened over the past year.

“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?'” Kizito explained, noting the proliferation of deepfakes and AI-generated content has accelerated the spread of health misinformation.

On Wednesday, the Canadian Medical Association (CMA), alongside provincial and territorial medical organizations, issued an urgent call to action against false health information that is “increasingly shaping public discourse, public beliefs, and policy actions.” The coalition of medical professionals warns that patients are increasingly rejecting proven treatments, sometimes with fatal consequences.

Tim Caulfield, a law professor at the University of Alberta’s School of Public Health and a signatory to the CMA statement, points to social media influencers and podcasters as major vectors of misinformation. “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.”

The consequences can be severe. Increased vaccine hesitancy has led to resurgences of preventable diseases like measles. Financial exploitation occurs when consumers spend money on unproven supplements. And in some cases, misinformation directly contributes to patient deaths.

Dr. Joseph Dahine, an intensive care physician in Laval, Quebec, who counters misinformation on TikTok, recounted treating a COVID-19 patient in 2021 who denied the disease’s existence. “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 has witnessed other tragedies, including young cancer patients pursuing ineffective “natural” treatments and individuals ignoring symptoms of metastatic breast cancer until their conditions became incurable.

Dr. Margot Burnell, CMA president and oncologist, proposes a two-pronged solution: improving access to primary healthcare so patients can consult medical professionals rather than social media, and presenting patients with scientific facts about treatments in a compassionate manner.

“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,” Burnell explained. “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 agrees with the CMA’s call for better access to medical professionals. “If it’s two in the morning and you’re worried about something, Google should not be the first reflex,” he said, adding that the same applies to TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook. “It should be someone with the credentials to help you.”

Unlike influencers who often promote supplements or courses for profit, Dahine emphasizes that physicians who educate online aren’t trying to sell products. The CMA statement specifically counters prevalent misinformation, citing evidence that vaccines don’t cause autism, ivermectin isn’t effective against COVID or cancer, and COVID vaccines are safe and effective.

Combating misinformation requires multiple strategies, according to Caulfield. These include warning people about potential misinformation, debunking false claims, teaching critical thinking and media literacy, emphasizing scientific consensus, and encouraging people to pause before sharing content.

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

For her part, Kizito takes a measured approach when friends share questionable health content. Rather than dismissing them outright, she applies MediaSmarts’ verification process: “I ask them, OK, who posted this content, find the original source and then we go on from there.”

As deepfakes and AI-generated content continue to proliferate, health officials warn that this coordinated effort to combat misinformation is no longer optional—it’s essential to public health.