KENYA— Investigative media platform, Fumbua.ke, has released a report accusing Meta, Youtube, and Google of profiting from posts advertising & selling harmful and useless health products to Kenyan Women
The platforms permit ads for potentially harmful products including vaginal ‘cleanse’ balls and useless herbs for infertility, according to the investigation from Fumbua.ke.
Researchers from the media collective Fumbua.ke have accused the big firms of amplifying content that promises unproven cures for infertility and herbs that can wade off cancers on their networks.
“Facebook’s own algorithms are often amplifying this content and are letting ads for detox remedies target Kenyan users. Google and YouTube are also part of this harmful system, profiting off ads for vaginal detox products despite evident health risks,” said the report.
Wanjiru Nguhi, who led the research, said that what was most alarming is how freely these adverts are available and people were not just able to sell things that were harmful, but to do so publicly and even pay for these adverts to go viral.
“There’s an audacious impunity about it,” Nguhi reiterated.
Kristina Wilfore, co-founder of ShePersisted, an initiative to address gendered disinformation, and which supported the investigation, added that scam products were being delivered into the Kenyan marketplace while big tech was asleep at the wheel.
Their investigation unearthed Facebook pages selling yoni pearls, mesh-wrapped herb balls, to be inserted in the vagina to “cleanse” the uterus and protect women from cervical cancer.
Additionally, the page also promised that steaming, which involves sitting over a bowl of boiling water, was a treatment for endometriosis.
Medical experts have cautioned against using herb balls, which can sell online for about US$7, and products for vaginal steaming, saying they are unnecessary and can cause pain and infections.
“You’re trying to clean your vagina but, in the process, you’re actually increasing your vulnerability,” said Jacqueline Chesang, a reproductive health specialist.
Chesang also noted that vaginas were self-cleaning and contained healthy bacteria that ward off infections and cleansing & steaming rituals interfere with the vagina’s pH balance and leave it more vulnerable to infection.
Chesang said she was concerned that online treatments might stop women seeking medical help for conditions.
Responsible social media use in Kenya lacking
Fumbua.ke research comes at a time of greater scrutiny of social media platforms in Kenya, including Meta which is facing three lawsuits alleging inadequacies in its content moderation systems.
The cases have led to greater scrutiny by the country’s social media monitoring bodies.
A report by Kenya’s Council for Responsible Social Media found that almost half of respondents said they had seen misinformation on social media sites, while half believed they could confidently identify it.
About 9.25 million Kenyans use Facebook, 9.44 million use YouTube and 2.2 million people use Instagram, according to ‘The state of digital in Kenya in 2023’ report.
The researchers at Fumbua.ke believe the marketing is exploiting pressures on women to conform to unattainable standards of sexuality and ill-informed notions of female hygiene.
Gender specialist Evelyne Opondo said a reluctance to talk about sex and menstruation meant many women rely on the Internet for health advice.
“We need to make sure that the platforms remain safe for women and girls. A lot of people are relying on this information,” said Opondo, a member of Kenya’s Council for Responsible social media.
Advocating for credible information, verified & rated content
According to its website, Meta works with fact-checkers in Africa to review and rate content on its platforms.
Additionally, any material labelled false or misleading appears lower in the feed and is filtered out of “explore” on Instagram.
Meta said the vaginal detox content did not violate its policies, “We remove content that promotes harmful miracle cures for health issues when the treatments are widely deemed likely to directly contribute to the risk of serious injury or death,” a company statement said.
Meta also said it rejected ads on content rated misleading by its fact-checkers.
A YouTube spokesperson said after reviewing Fumbua’s report, the company had removed adverts that violated its policies and “demonetized several videos” flagged by the organization.
Google declined to comment although, on its, the organization reported blocking or removing 51.2 million adverts due to inappropriate or harmful content in 2022.
The blog added that it had taken “extensive measures to tackle misinformation and unreliable claims in [its] advertising ecosystem”.
Despite these, Fumbua.ke researchers said more needs to be done, adding that the higher visibility of such products in Kenya, may be an early warning of harmful health trends across the region.
Fumbua.ke is a collaborative media project aimed at unraveling and investigating suspicious information about public policies that have been shared on social media or messaging apps
Launched to tackle electoral mis/dis-information during the Kenyan 2022 General elections and the next phase of their work investigates the financial and social impact of mis/disinformation.
The collective notes that its partners work collaboratively to promote responsible and ethical journalism through media literacy activities, ultimately improving the quality of information consumed by the public.
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