Thai Health Websites Mostly Unreliable

[george]

Health websites mostly unreliable

Pose danger, plug products, study finds

BANGKOK: -- Most of the almost 2,000 Thai health websites are unreliable and pose a potential danger to people seeking advice, says a study by the Health Systems Research Institute.

HSRI researchers who tracked 1,888 local websites providing health information last year found that 99% could not be relied upon to offer correct advice.

''Many websites provide only general messages regarding health for readers without giving sources or references. They can quickly give information to readers but they can mislead the public too,'' said Sukanya Prajusilp, the project's team leader.

The study by HSRI, a government agency set up to promote research on health issues, said many health sites failed to pass its evaluation based on criteria such as what sources of information the websites used and whether they carried warnings telling visitors to exercise discretion.

Webmasters failed to include details such as who provided the information, when it was released and latest developments on the issue, she said.

Ms Sukanya suspected most sites were created with commercial motives, to sell health and pharmaceutical products. Many carried misleading information and advertisements without authorisation or contained improper language.

Vitaya Kulsomboon, of Chulalongkorn University's faculty of pharmaceutical sciences and an advocate on health consumer protection, said many health websites were geared toward direct selling herbal drugs and supplementary diets. They claimed these traditional remedies could cure chronic illnesses and diseases such as cancer, kidney disease and stroke.

The study proposed that an independent body on consumer protection, state agencies, academics and medical institutes work together to monitor and manage health information on the internet. They should tell webmasters to improve their content and urge website visitors to exercise discretion.

Mr Vitaya said the Food and Drug Administration should enforce food and drug laws against illegal health products, and screen websites sending spam (unsolicited emails containing advertisements).

The law did not cover websites which exaggerated details of supplementary diets. The Food Act only punishes people exaggerating the benefits of food products. Violators face up to a three-year jail term and 30,000-baht fine. Promoting drugs and pharmaceutical products without approval from health authorities carries a 100,000-baht fine.

''The FDA should protect consumers' interests, not those of business operators exploiting loopholes in the law by selling substandard products to exploit people's health,'' he said.

Pakdee Pothisiri, the FDA secretary general, said the FDA had been able to punish fewer than 20 firms offering those products on the internet as it lacked the staff to monitor them.

--Bangkok Post 2005-04-16