CONSPIRACY THEORIES

6 Reasons Why People Believe Health Misinformation

How to understand misinformed people and their sources of misinformation

October 15, 2025

 

--Reasons 1 and 2: Mistrust of Experts and Personal Autonomy

--Reason 3: Misinformation Makes Money (and Advances Other Agendas)

--Reason 4: Misinformation Sounds Like It’s True

--Reasons 5 and 6: Charisma and Simplicity Sell Soothing Misinformation

...

"Social media platforms support the spread of health misinformation with algorithms that show people things that produce fear or anxiety because that type of content generates more likes, shares, and re-posts—all of which benefit the social media company."

...

Conclusion

"People who believe health misinformation are not bad people or stupid. Rather, they should be viewed as victims that sellers of misinformation have taken advantage of because of their misplaced mistrust and strong personal autonomy. I use the term “victim” here because the solution to helping misinformed people is to engage with them in personal and emotionally engaging ways."

 

Psychology Today

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/misinformation-in-life-and-society/202510/6-reasons-why-people-believe-health-misinformation

 

Vaccine Misinformation Outpaces Efforts to Counter It

January 16, 2024

 

"Misinformation about vaccines has proliferated on social media where it has led to rising levels of vaccine hesitancy at a faster rate than interventions are addressing it, according to a study led by a researcher at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Some interventions to counter vaccine misinformation on social media have been beneficial, but very few test their effect on real-world behaviors. The findings are published in the peer-reviewed journal BMJ. [emphasis added]

...

Anti-vaccine misinformation is as old as vaccines themselves, but anti-vaccine campaigns have proliferated in recent years on social media—particularly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. This misinformation targets all kinds of vaccines, including childhood vaccines, COVID-19, flu, HPV, and more. While vaccine hesitancy can stem from many sources, including mass media and political rhetoric, as well as genuine safety concerns, there is ample evidence that a proliferation of anti-vaccine messages on social media increased vaccine hesitancy and lowered vaccination rates over the same period that social media networks expanded. The return of measles after aggressive antivaccine campaigns prompted the World Health Organization to list vaccine hesitancy among the greatest threats to global health. [emphasis added]

 

Campaigns to promote vaccine uptake and reduce hesitancy take various approaches, such as debunking (fact-checking specific claims after they have reached social media users) and “prebunking,” in which users are taught about how “fake news” works before exposure. Other intervention types include warning (“inoculating”) people about manipulation tactics, and using accuracy prompts to trigger people to consider the truthfulness of material they are about to share on social media platforms, without stopping them from posting"

 

(more)

 

Columbia Mailman School of Public Health

https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/vaccine-misinformation-outpaces-efforts-counter-it

 

 

38 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

CONSPIRACY THEORIES

6 Reasons Why People Believe Health Misinformation

How to understand misinformed people and their sources of misinformation

October 15, 2025

 

--Reasons 1 and 2: Mistrust of Experts and Personal Autonomy

--Reason 3: Misinformation Makes Money (and Advances Other Agendas)

--Reason 4: Misinformation Sounds Like It’s True

--Reasons 5 and 6: Charisma and Simplicity Sell Soothing Misinformation

...

"Social media platforms support the spread of health misinformation with algorithms that show people things that produce fear or anxiety because that type of content generates more likes, shares, and re-posts—all of which benefit the social media company."

...

Conclusion

"People who believe health misinformation are not bad people or stupid. Rather, they should be viewed as victims that sellers of misinformation have taken advantage of because of their misplaced mistrust and strong personal autonomy. I use the term “victim” here because the solution to helping misinformed people is to engage with them in personal and emotionally engaging ways."

 

Psychology Today

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/misinformation-in-life-and-society/202510/6-reasons-why-people-believe-health-misinformation

 

Also, folk listen too, and are taken in nutters.......😒

11 hours ago, transam said:

Also, folk listen too, and are taken in nutters.......😒

 

don't go there, man. 

 

Just now, save the frogs said:

 

don't go there, man. 

 

I never go with nutters, in my private life I have sorted out and avoid the farangy nutters...

To the title ...

 

... Because they believe the government and health organizations wouldn't lie to you  ... go figure.

 

If anything the scamdemic proved that to be a huge mistake ... IMHO

A familiar saying on the topic, explaining how the internet has contributed to the massive spread of health misinformation:

 

--A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes

 

12 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

"People who believe health misinformation are not bad people or stupid. Rather, they should be viewed as victims that sellers of misinformation have taken advantage of because of their misplaced mistrust and strong personal autonomy. I use the term “victim” here because the solution to helping misinformed people is to engage with them in personal and emotionally engaging ways."

 

Nobody likes to admit they've been duped, but we've all been duped at some point or other.

For one thing, some issues are so complex it's not that hard for someone to pull the wool over our eyes.

Unless you spend hours and hours researching something ... and even then, it's not easy to know what's really going on.

 

More bad news for you. There are no neat little boxes.

 

Sometimes mainstream is lying to you, sometimes not.

Sometimes conspiracies are fake, sometimes not.

 

So it's not a good idea to be too firmly entrenched on either side.

 

Some guys on here are completely dismissing the entire medical industry .... we'd all be dead a long time ago if we never had access to medical intervention. 

 

Calling the other guys "nutters" .... well, again, maybe admit you've been duped sometimes . 

 

You just gotta not beat yourself up over the head when you realize you been duped.

 

And roll with the punches.

 

 

As you well know, scientific knowledge and consensus is an ever evolving thing. And sometimes scientists get things wrong, but that usually does get corrected thru the various mechanisms of science and credible research.

 

As opposed to the nutjob pseudoscience and conspiracy theory fringe types who start off so far off the range that there's no way back.

 

You can't make any comparison between the two. They're entirely opposite worlds, the first usually pretty reliable in the big picture scheme of things, and the second chronically non-credible and unreliable who often start out with the specific intention to mislead.

 

From the OP report:

Misinformation Makes Money (and Advances Other Agendas)

"Those individuals and businesses often operate on social media where the platforms have no liability for the accuracy of the information (i.e., “content”) posted or shared by their users. And they typically make money through the sale of some type of product (e.g., nutritional supplements, books, or videos) or through advertising."

 

What is the definition of 'mis-information'?

And who makes that decision??

Throughout history the 'experts' have been proven wrong.

Plus throughout history - fascists socialists and communists have used force to shut down dissent and argument, in order to enforce their dictated rules/beliefs.

 

 

"Misinformation is false or inaccurate information—getting the facts wrong. Disinformation is false information which is deliberately intended to mislead—intentionally misstating the facts.

 

The spread of misinformation and disinformation has affected our ability to improve public health, address climate change, maintain a stable democracy, and more."

 

https://www.apa.org/topics/journalism-facts/misinformation-disinformation

 

22 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

A familiar saying on the topic, explaining how the internet has contributed to the massive spread of health misinformation:

 

--A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes

 

 

Surely "A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes vegan leather sandals"

1 hour ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

CONSPIRACY THEORIES

6 Reasons Why People Believe Health Misinformation

How to understand misinformed people and their sources of misinformation

October 15, 2025

 

--Reasons 1 and 2: Mistrust of Experts and Personal Autonomy

--Reason 3: Misinformation Makes Money (and Advances Other Agendas)

--Reason 4: Misinformation Sounds Like It’s True

--Reasons 5 and 6: Charisma and Simplicity Sell Soothing Misinformation

...

"Social media platforms support the spread of health misinformation with algorithms that show people things that produce fear or anxiety because that type of content generates more likes, shares, and re-posts—all of which benefit the social media company."

...

Conclusion

"People who believe health misinformation are not bad people or stupid. Rather, they should be viewed as victims that sellers of misinformation have taken advantage of because of their misplaced mistrust and strong personal autonomy. I use the term “victim” here because the solution to helping misinformed people is to engage with them in personal and emotionally engaging ways."

 

Psychology Today

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/misinformation-in-life-and-society/202510/6-reasons-why-people-believe-health-misinformation

 

Under which of those do you classify as low IQ, lack of education, sheer stupidity?  I'm amazed at how 'stupid' some adults are, seemingly having passed by even a basic education and acquiring of common sense 🙂

11 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

As you well know, scientific knowledge and consensus is an ever evolving thing. And sometimes scientists get things wrong, but that usually does get corrected thru the various mechanisms of science and credible research.

 

No.

 

Sometimes Politics > Science and science needs to match the politics

 

Not all scientific studies are "100% independent". Many of them are "funded" with interest groups with particular agendas. 

 

Watch the film "Thank You For Smoking".

It took many decades to find a link between cancer and smoking because the scientists were on the Big Tobacco companies payroll. 

 

 

33 minutes ago, save the frogs said:

 

No.

 

Sometimes Politics > Science and science needs to match the politics

 

https://www.apa.org/topics/journalism-facts/misinformation-disinformation

 

Watch the film "Thank You For Smoking".

It took many decades to find a link between cancer and smoking because the scientists were on the Big Tobacco companies payroll. 

 

 

 

 

Some research is supported by commercial interests, which in the modern era is publicly disclosed, and a lot of research is not, contrary to the claims of misinformation peddlers.  But it's their common ploy to falsely claim that no credible science can be believed due to financial interests -- all the while they're profiting from their bogus YouTube videos, advertising revenues, selling fake cures and treatments, etc etc.

 

But your smoking and cancer issue above is a good illustration of what I was saying above, although it occurred in a very different era when researcher disclosure requirements didn't exist the way they do now. As I said, eventually, science does correct itself and what the actual science really shows does emerge and become understood to be the truth.

 

That's not what happens in the whack job, quackery world.

 

Re smoking and cancer, it was science and scientists who provided the credible proof of the link between smoking and cancer, as shown below:

 

"The 1950s marked a turning point, with multiple large-scale studies [poster comment - science at work] providing undeniable evidence that smoking causes lung cancer.

 

Official government warnings (1957 onward)

The accumulating scientific evidence eventually prompted government action and public health campaigns. 

1957: U.S. Surgeon General Leroy Burney stated the official position of the U.S. Public Health Service, confirming a causal link between smoking and lung cancer.

 

Despite mounting evidence, the tobacco industry actively worked to undermine and create controversy around the scientific findings." 

 

--AI assisted

 

25 minutes ago, save the frogs said:

 

No.

 

Sometimes Politics > Science and science needs to match the politics

 

Not all scientific studies are "100% independent". Many of them are "funded" with interest groups with particular agendas. 

 

Watch the film "Thank You For Smoking".

It took many decades to find a link between cancer and smoking because the scientists were on the Big Tobacco companies payroll. 

 

 

 

The link between cancer and tobacco was not delayed because scientists were on Big Tobacco companies payroll. The explanation is provided here;  https://www.cancer.org/research/acs-research-news/the-study-that-helped-spur-the-us-stop-smoking-movement.html

 

 

33 minutes ago, Patong2021 said:

 

The link between cancer and tobacco was not delayed because scientists were on Big Tobacco companies payroll. The explanation is provided here;  https://www.cancer.org/research/acs-research-news/the-study-that-helped-spur-the-us-stop-smoking-movement.html

 

 

 

Thanks for the above article and its explanation of how science and scientists were the ones, hardly surprisingly, who provided the conclusive links between smoking and cancer:

Two American Cancer Society Researchers Get to Work

"To address the criticism of the retrospective studies – and to strengthen the evidence that smoking is a cause of lung cancer – E. Cuyler Hammond, Ph.D., and Daniel Horn, Ph.D., scientists working for the American Cancer Society, started work on what is known as a cohort study.

...

In January 1952, Hammond and Horn engaged 22,000 American Cancer Society volunteers to help recruit a large group of American men aged 50 to 69 across 10 U.S. states and ask these men about their smoking habits. The scientists ended up with a cohort of about 188,000 men, who they eventually followed through 1955.

...

‘Cause and Effect Relationships’

After following the men for about 20 months, Hammond and Horn had enough information to publish what they called “preliminary” findings in an August 7, 1954 Journal of the American Medical Association article. Their conclusion was clear: “It was found that men with a history of regular cigarette smoking have a considerably higher death rate than men who have never smoked or men who have smoked only cigars or pipes,” the researchers wrote.

...

Hammond and Horn’s results were uniquely important at the time, says Susan Gapstur, Ph.D., vice president of the American Cancer Society’s epidemiology research program. “Their study – along with the British Doctor’s study conducted around the same time – were the first two large prospective studies to establish a link between smoking and the subsequent risk of death from lung cancer and other diseases.” [emphasis added]

 

 

That's the kind of work that credible scientists do and science does every day around the world, and society benefits from it.

 

Just like with the following:

 

2023-10-02

 

"The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet has today decided to award

the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for their discoveries concerning nucleoside base modifications that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.

 

The discoveries by the two Nobel Laureates were critical for developing effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19 during the pandemic that began in early 2020. Through their groundbreaking findings, which have fundamentally changed our understanding of how mRNA interacts with our immune system, the laureates contributed to the unprecedented rate of vaccine development during one of the greatest threats to human health in modern times. [emphasis added]

 

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2023/press-release/

 

 

 

Fauci lied…..people died.

11 minutes ago, Airalee said:

Fauci lied…..people died.

 

People died from COVID the disease, and COVID and vaccine misinformation, not from anything to do with Anthony Fauci:

 

The Impact of the Global COVID-19 Vaccination Campaign on All-Cause Mortality

October 2023

 

"Leveraging the staggered rollout of vaccines, we find that the vaccination campaign across 141 countries averted 2.4 million excess deaths, valued at $6.5 trillion. We also find that an equitable counterfactual distribution of vaccines, with vaccination in each country proportional to its population, would have saved roughly 670,000 more lives."

 

https://www.nber.org/papers/w31812

 

 

Quarter of US COVID-19 deaths could have been prevented by vaccination: analysis

 

04/22/22 

 

"A new analysis finds that approximately 234,000 U.S. deaths from COVID-19 since June 2021 could have been prevented if people had been vaccinated.  

 

The analysis from the Peterson Center on Healthcare and the Kaiser Family Foundation underscores the importance of vaccination, and indicates a significant portion of the heavy toll from the virus could have been prevented.  

 

The 234,000 preventable deaths translates to about one quarter of the nearly 1 million U.S. deaths from the virus since the pandemic began, and 60 percent of the deaths since June 2021, when vaccines became widely available."

 

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/3459664-quarter-of-us-covid-19-deaths-could-have-been-prevented-by-vaccination-analysis/

 

Seems to me there is a similarity to religion.

 

13 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

But it's their common ploy to falsely claim that no credible science can be believed due to financial interests -- all the while they're profiting from their bogus YouTube videos, advertising revenues, selling fake cures and treatments, etc etc.

 

Yes, that is a more balanced and accurate representation. 

They falsely attack the entire system if SOME studies lack integrity. 

And the conspiracy guys sometimes have their own agendas.

Agreed. 

 

Is the funding behind the studies always fully transparent? That I am not sure about. 

58 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

People died from COVID the disease, and COVID and vaccine misinformation, not from anything to do with Anthony Fauci:

Oh no they didn't Sir. 

 

Too much BBC/CNN/Fox for you.

 

Not one person died from covid worldwide. No one even got sick from covid worldwide.

 

The virus that supposedly caused covid was a giant hoax. Why do you think it's commonly referred to as The Plandemic?

 

If you think I'm wrong show me where the virus has been isolated, and had experiments put to it, to show it's infectious properties. I'll save you the bother. You can't; cause there ain't any.

 

Mam is responsible for hurting man. Nature only cures.

15 minutes ago, save the frogs said:

Is the funding behind the studies always fully transparent? That I am not sure about. 

Not only funding for trials and studies. But the dosh, to ease a product onto market. It's hard to find out where it originates.

 

The most famous of all the drugs, that got onto the market, that shouldn't have, was Thalidomide. In the US, the pushers were so sure that the FDA was gonna OK it - although the trial evidence was simply not conclusive - that they distributed the drug into the community in anticipation.

 

But it didn't get the nod. Only one person said 'no'. What did she see that the others did not. $$$$$ perhaps.

2 minutes ago, Stiddle Mump said:

Not only funding for trials and studies. But the dosh, to ease a product onto market. It's hard to find out where it originates.

 

The most famous of all the drugs, that got onto the market, that shouldn't have, was Thalidomide. In the US, the pushers were so sure that the FDA was gonna OK it - although the trial evidence was simply not conclusive - that they distributed the drug into the community in anticipation.

 

But it didn't get the nod. Only one person said 'no'. What did she see that the others did not. $$$$$ perhaps.

A 1957 drug, scrapping the barrel now.............Your agenda is showing again..🤮

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide

34 minutes ago, save the frogs said:

 

Yes, that is a more balanced and accurate representation. 

They falsely attack the entire system if SOME studies lack integrity. 

And the conspiracy guys sometimes have their own agendas.

Agreed. 

 

Is the funding behind the studies always fully transparent? That I am not sure about. 

 

Every public health related study I read these days has a section where the author declare if they have any relevant financial interests, and if so, what those sources are.

 

Is it misinformation or disinformation? Big difference between them and one is more sinister than the other.

4 minutes ago, transam said:

A 1957 drug, scrapping the barrel now.............Your agenda is showing again..🤮

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide

Sir! This was a landmark medical event. Don't have to scrape no barrel.

 

A lot of controversy about it in the US. Also a lot of covering up why it got so many thumbs up when it was obviously not fit for purpose..

 

Thalidomide; anti-nature personified.

Several more off-topic posts exchanging personal comments about forum members have been removed, pursuant to the forum's rules.

4 minutes ago, Stiddle Mump said:

Sir! This was a landmark medical event. Don't have to scrape no barrel.

 

A lot of controversy about it in the US. Also a lot of covering up why it got so many thumbs up when it was obviously not fit for purpose..

 

Thalidomide; anti-nature personified.

From near 70 years back.................😁

Yes, you are scrapping the barrel..........

 

Now tell us about the drugs that have saved millions of lives.....?

But you won't, goes against your ridiculous agenda.......😬

11 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

Every public health related study I read these days has a section where the author declare if they have any relevant financial interests, and if so, what those sources are.

 

No need,

97% of all scientists agree with their employers.