A thought on where you get your health information

“If you want to avoid a trip to the ER, I’d say get your advice from real doctors instead of a 25-year-old woman on TikTok with three first names.”
— Gina Ippolito

This will be the first time I’ve taken a quote o’ the day from a breakdown of a TV show, but Gina Ippolito’s quip about wellness influencers — a subject I’m increasingly fascinated by and concerned about — hit home.

The comment is from her recap last week of the 13th episode of the second season of The Pitt, and a lighter plotline about a woman who consumed way, way too much turmeric. The character (played by Sara Wyle, who’s married to series star and executive producer Noah Wyle) insists she only makes healthy decisions, but has found she got sick from, as she calls it, a spice.

Not just nauseous, by the way: her liver was damaged, raising the risk of liver failure if an intervention had not happened.

Lesson: anything in extreme quantities can harm or even kill, and that includes water, including what we learned in a notorious 2007 U.S. case when a Sacramento radio station held a contest for extreme consumption of water without urinating, leading to fatal consequences.

We’re in a weird moment where expertise is often and instantly met with skepticism, and so-called influencers selling products like supplements — which are often not regulated — are embraced without critical thinking.

Here’s Gina Ippolito’s full breakdown of that episode, by the way.

A thought on where you get your health information

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