If misinformation and disinformation are “a societal threat”, according to a leading medical journal, then what are we to make of the alarming convergence of media, corporate and political power that has been on display in the United States this week?
The column this week also brings encouraging news about trust in scientists and vaping control, as well as a new publication to support the creation of urban green spaces.
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The quotable?
The easiest route these days to viewership is by creating enemies.”
In the spotlight: media power
An editorial in the latest edition of The Lancet warns that misinformation and disinformation “can no longer be viewed simply as an academic nuisance, but rather they are a societal threat”.
“Only if we recognise that threat and act proportionately can we respond to the danger and combat the tide of misinformation and disinformation that has the potential to seriously undermine public health,” it says.
Unfortunately, the editorial doesn’t suggest ways to tackle the commercial and political might of Big Tech companies, so blatantly on display at the inauguration of President Donald Trump. As The Guardian reported, global billionaire tech titans were seated in front of his own cabinet picks.
Worth reading is a Bloomberg investigation, ‘The Second Trump Presidency, Brought to You by YouTubers’, examining how popular podcasters including Joe Rogan, Theo Von and Logan Paul are mobilising America’s men to lean right.
Rogan, who was close to hand as Trump was sworn in, did a three-hour interview with him in late October that drew about 50 million views on YouTube.
“The fact that Rogan, the host of the world’s most popular podcast, watched from the Capitol Rotunda as Republican luminaries like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis were confined to overflow speaks volumes about the new dynamics at play in Washington and the media writ large,” says the report.
The Bloomberg team watched and analysed over 2,000 videos from nine prominent YouTubers, reviewing nearly 1,300 hours of footage from their channels, mapping out the podcasters’ guest networks and documenting the frequency of key political messages distributed to tens of millions of subscribers each day.
“None of the broadcasters style themselves as political pundits, and their conservative talking points were sandwiched between free-wheeling discussions of sports, masculinity, internet culture, gambling and pranks – making the rhetoric more palatable to an apolitical audience,” Bloomberg reported.
One of the podcasters explained their technique: “The easiest route these days to viewership is by creating enemies.”
The podcasters’ popularity is sparking a “very big sea change in terms of who are the voices that matter,” Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg told Rogan in a conversation published earlier this month. “There’s this wholesale generational shift in who are the people who are being listened to,” he said.
The report also documents how Big Tech companies, including Meta, Google, X and others, are winding back protections on their platforms, with some podcasts airing white supremacy talking points.
The professional kickboxer and self-proclaimed misogynist Andrew Tate, who is currently under investigation by Romanian authorities for allegedly trafficking minors and money laundering, holds the second-highest viewership on the podcasts overall, Bloomberg reported.
On a more encouraging note, a large international study challenges the idea that there is a widespread lack of public trust in scientists, finding that in most countries, scientists and scientific methods are trusted. This finding is in line with other international studies on trust in scientists.
Published in Nature Human Behaviour, the survey of 71,922 people in 68 countries found that while trust in science is moderately high overall, there are notable variations across countries and regions. For example, Russia as well as several former Soviet republics and satellite states (such as Kazakhstan) show relatively low trust in scientists.
The researchers also found that low trust in scientists is associated with science-related populist attitudes – beliefs that people’s common sense is superior to the expertise of scientists and scientific institutions.
This corroborates other findings and provides evidence that populist resentment against science, a prevalent component of the trust crisis narrative, may undermine public trust in scientists, the researchers say.
“While no country has low trust in scientists on average, lack of trust in scientists by even a small minority needs to be taken seriously,” they report.
“Distrusting minorities may affect considerations of scientific evidence in policymaking, as well as decisions by individuals that can affect society at large, especially if they receive extensive news media coverage and include people in positions of power that can influence policymaking.
“A minority of 10 percent can be sufficient to flip a majority, and when a critical mass value of 25 percent is reached, majority opinion can be tipped.”
The researchers added that they did not mean to imply that trust in scientists is always due. “In some situations, low trust may be warranted,” they said.
“For example, science’s fraught historical relationship with racism, its role in perpetuating racialised forms of knowledge production, sustaining racial paradigms and disregarding ethical canons by experimenting on non-white human subjects, has reduced research participation in some populations.”
Other global health updates
UNDP chief: Gaza must ‘rebuild 60 years of lost development’
A new publication, Healthier Cities and Communities Through Public Spaces: A guidance paper, notes that public green spaces yield numerous health benefits, including increased exercise, reduced stress, improved wellbeing, and reduced exposure to air pollution.
Their potential benefits in reducing healthcare costs, present “a compelling financial argument for investing in public spaces”, the paper says.
It includes recommendations to guide urban planners, policymakers, and community stakeholders in creating and maintaining public spaces that contribute to healthier, more inclusive, and sustainable urban environments.
Nutrition International’s new principles of engagement set clear boundaries on interactions with the ultra-processed food industry and highlight the importance of keeping nutrition policy and regulatory spaces free from conflict of interest.
Public health
https://www.healthpromotion.org.au/news/ahpa-updates/2937-thinker-in-residence-2024-dr-katherine-trebeck
https://www.deakin.edu.au/about-deakin/news-and-media-releases/articles/new-$8m-victorian-research-centre-to-drive-research-on-economic-and-commercial-determinants-of-health-and-wellbeing 
Dr Sandro Demaio will lead the World Health Organization’s regional work on climate, environment, and health, based in Seoul, South Korea. (More details are here.)
Appointments, awards and opportunities
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