I heard a story the other day. A famous doctor launched a website. It is a website that presents medical know-how to the general public in simple language. The doctor is concerned that the number of outpatients, especially the elderly, is increasing rapidly, but the shortage of doctors and manpower is becoming more serious, and if things continue as they are, Japan’s medical system will collapse. He thought that one way to avoid this would be to reduce the number of outpatients. In fact, there are diseases that can be easily cured without the intervention of a doctor, so the idea is to provide proper medical information so that people can cure such diseases by doing it themselves.
However, he hit an unexpected wall.
The doctor is not trying to be eccentric, but he is disliked by his readers and does not trust him very much. On the other hand, people are being drawn to nonscientific, nonsense medicine. Seeing this situation, he went beyond being surprised and even felt fear.
On the web, correct information is often rejected, and interesting but impactful information is praised. When I talk to IT professionals about this topic, I usually come to the following conclusion: “Previously, the Internet was mainly used by people with relatively high literacy, but due to its explosive spread, it is now mainly used by people with low literacy, making it easier for false information to be spread.”
That’s true, but is it really okay to leave this situation as it is? At least, the doctor in question doesn’t think so. He argues that unless correct information is accepted as correct and incorrect information is rejected as incorrect, society’s trust will plummet.
False information on the Internet is an old and new problem, so strangely we tend to become numb to it and just accept it as the way it is, but it’s true that we can’t leave it alone forever. Now may be the time to take action to rectify the situation. (Kei Kitajima)

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