The Internet can never be wholly trusted for accuracy, especially when it comes to medical information (remember all of the autism videos on YouTube?). Therefore, ACSH staffers were surprised by the small degree of error found on breast cancer websites according to a study published in the journal Cancer it's only 5%.
Researchers stated that most consumers use general-search engines when looking for medical information on the internet, and most don't go past the first page of search results. Using major search sites the research team came up with 343 Web pages and found that the 5% that have inaccuracies were mostly ones that offered complementary or alternative medicines.
"That's because there's no such thing as alternative medicine," ACSH's Dr. Gil Ross explained. "It's either medicine or it's not."
As ACSH's Dr. Ruth Kava pointed out, it's perturbing to think even 5% of sites are feeding people false information, but there is a silver lining -- it's a much lower percentage than one would expect.
