Risk Communication

Risks can be communicated to the public with one of two goals in mind: to provide the available scientific evidence in an understandable way and thereby enable people to make their own informed decisions or to provide biased information to influence people&s;s behavior so that they will make decisions from which other groups such as industry and politics profit. In cancer screening, the dilemma is that both goals cannot be achieved at the same time: Fewer people would participate if they knew the scientific evidence about its benefits and harms. I explain how evidence can be communicated in a transparent way as well as the deceptive techniques used by screening campaigns to increase participation rate at the cost of misinforming the public. This deception is widely successful because most people, doctors and politicians included, do not understand health statistics and are often unaware of their innumeracy. I use my own experience in teaching continuing medical education (CME) courses for physicians and working with healthcare professionals to ground this chapter in the real world and to help unmask the tools of truth and trickery.