Experts available to discuss the Surgeon General’s warning about the “urgent threat of health misinformation” and ways to address this challenge
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 20, 2021 — U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy recently issued an advisory warning Americans about the “urgent threat of health misinformation” in the country’s fight against COVID-19. Dr. Murthy raised dire concerns “about misinformation as having hindered vaccination efforts, sown mistrust, caused people to reject public health measures, use unproven treatments, prolonged the pandemic and put lives at risk.”
The News Literacy Project (NLP), a nonpartisan national education nonprofit, has long worked to help people discern fact from fiction in a complex digitally connected world.
Peter Adams, senior vice president of education, and Ebonee Rice, senior vice president of NLP’s educator network, can discuss solutions to this problem and provide practical tips, including how to:
- Determine the credibility of news and other content.
- Identify different types of information.
- Use the standards of authoritative, fact-based journalism to determine what to trust, share and act on.
To speak with Peter or Ebonee, contact: [email protected].
Additional resources:
- NLP’s “Combating COVID-19 vaccine misinformation” webpage includes links to reputable sources, debunked misinformation, information about understanding vaccine data and resources for educators and the public that provide guidance on staying healthy.
- We produced a special episode of NLP’s Is that a fact? podcast featuring Dr. Erica Pan, California state epidemiologist, and Brandy Zadrozny, a senior misinformation reporter for NBC News.
- NLP founder and CEO Alan C. Miller wrote a widely read column about why it was so important for the media to get the vaccine story right.