The Covid-19 pandemic illustrates the challenges of science communication and the dangers of unreliable or false health information. How do we communicate about reliable health information in a fluctuating information landscape, where new research is constantly emerging, often with an absence of scientific consensus or to patrons who lack basic scientific understanding or knowledge? Many studies and surveys report that people trust libraries as facilitators of reliable information on health issues.  Libraries play an active and important role as information literacy experts, where each type of library, whether public, school, special or academic plays a critical role in educating about and fighting misinformation.

In this presentation you will learn:About health misinformation in historical context;

• What are the various types of health misinformation, their definitions and how to recognize them;
• Why people share health misinformation or create/share harmful health information;
• What are the most common tactics or venues to spread health misinformation;
• Strategies on how to talk to and educate your patrons about health misinformation and how to teach your patrons to critically evaluate the information sources they encounter;
• Where to find reliable and trust-worthy health information.

And finally, provide you with a set of tools and resources to help you and your patrons understand, identify and stop health misinformation.   There is a companion LibGuide found at https://lib.umn.edu/healthmisinformation