Propaganda and and rumors about the H1N1 pandemic were spread through social media sites like Twitter

CHICAGO — Is Twitter spreading rumors? Are Facebook status updates accurate?

On social media sites, anyone can say anything with little to no repercussions. Through real-time messaging and instantaneous updates, social media has created an environment ripe for misinformation and inaccuracies.

It’s a challenge for public health officials worldwide, who use or plan to use social media in public health emergencies. Public health agencies are in the early stages of developing a social media identity; many local and state agencies don’t have Facebook or Twitter accounts. As they develop social media strategies, public health agencies are grappling with ways to drown out the rumors and propaganda spread through social media.

Anyone can tweet about a health emergency, and often times their credibility is unknown

“One of the wonderful things about social media is that it can be used by anyone,” said Holli Seitz, CDC social media specialist. “It does present some challenges about accuracies.”

World Health Organization officials have said anti-vaccination campaigns on social media impeded public health response to the H1N1 pandemic, according to reports from international news agency AFP. The WHO and the CDC used social media actively during H1N1, but they had to compete with other individuals and groups spreading rumors through Twitter and Facebook.

“[Social media] is a platform and anyone can use it who wants to,” said Margo Edmunds, instructor of Emergency and Risk Communication at John Hopkins University in Maryland.

Misperceptions and conflicting messages were rampant during the H1N1 pandemic. One Twitter user wrote that H1N1 is a “deadly trap” invented by the government and the H1N1 vaccine “it is one of the most dangerous vaccines ever devised.” In January, Natural News, an online natural health publication, tweeted, “The great swine flu hoax of 2009 is now falling apart at the seams.” Other social media users tried to capitalize on the pandemic, such as one Twitter account that advertised a “Swine Flu Survival Guide” for $74.

To ensure their messages are heard, public health agencies have to first establish their credibility on social media sites, Edmunds said. Traditionally, public health agencies have avoided media interaction. Once agencies become known to the social media community and brand themselves as the authorities, the public will more likely turn to them for information during a pandemic or emergency.

“I think that public health has to be much more interactive,” Edmunds said. “It’s about relationship building before you have a crisis.”

Communicating with a mobile population through social media will allow agencies to maintain an open dialogue, providing information not just when health officials think it’s salient, but when the public demands it. And – particularly important to a cash-strapped industry like public health – social media is free.

“I think it’s the future for making people aware of what’s going on,” Edmunds said.