Words by Megan Miller, Internews Health Director
I was fortunate enough to represent Internews and the Internews Health Journalism Network at a recent convening at the First International Meeting the Spanish Network of Health Journalists (ANIS) held at the San Cecilio Clinical University Hospital in Granada, Spain, framed within the Bio Med & Tech Talks congress. ANIS is a long-standing member of the HJN and its President, Graziella Almendral is a Health Mentor and Advisor for both the Internews Health team and the Latin America Regional Team at Internews.
During this meeting the following organizations: Salud Con Lupa (Peru), Spanish Association of Scientific Communication (Spain), National Association of Biotechnology Communicators (Comunica Biotec) (Spain) and the National Association of Health Journalists (Spain), discussed the persistence of mis/disinformation in health as a global concern and agreed to develop a manifesto to show solidarity and commitment to making marked change to the health mis/disinformation plight.
Over the course of two days, the group discussed issues including artificial intelligence, platform accountability, the difference between misinformation and disinformation in the health space as well as many other critical, cross-cutting topic areas. It was agreed that instead of agreeing the exact path forward as a group, the manifesto would announce that this group acknowledges health mis/disinformation as a major global concern and commits to establishing working groups to outline and brainstorm key areas of potential intervention among health journalists and communicators worldwide.
At the conclusion of the meeting, the organizations presented the final manifesto as part of the mainstage of the Bio Med & Tech Talks Conference and signed the document on the stage. Internews and the Internews Health Journalism Network look forward to contributing to the working groups and bringing its many years of experience and deep expertise in mis/disinformation around the world to the table to support in the outlining of key actions and next steps that health communicators around the world can do to mitigate the harms of health mis/disinformation.
Manifesto (English) (Note: This is a draft which is still being formatted)