The War on Science: How Can We Overcome the Burden of Misinformation and Disinformation?
The Africa Biennial Biosciences Communication (ABBC) symposium is a multi-stakeholder, multi-disciplinary platform that explores best-bet science communication practices for unlocking the potential of advancements in science, technology, and innovation. The 6th edition (ABBC 2025) addresses a critical challenge hindering Africa's adoption of innovative biosciences, some of which play a fundamental role in the delivery of One Health (OH) solutions and building sustainable food systems. While bio-innovations offer transformative potential in improving planetary health, mitigating climate change effects and advancing health and socio-economic outcomes, disinformation remains a formidable barrier. In fact, the World Economic Forum has declared disinformation the second biggest global risk after extreme weather.
Africa faces a convergence of food insecurity, disease burden, and environmental challenges, creating a complex crisis that threatens health and development. The continent bears the highest per capita prevalence of foodborne and zoonotic diseases, both problems originating from dysfunctional food systems. Three-quarters of newly emerging human diseases originate from animals, and Africa remains a hotspot for these spillover events, as seen with Ebola and Rift Valley Fever. The intensification of agriculture, deforestation, urban expansion, and climate change further weaken ecological and epidemiological regulatory processes, worsening the spread of infectious diseases and degrading natural resources essential for food production. A holistic OH approach is therefore essential in transforming food systems, reducing disease burdens, and fostering sustainable development.
Further, “integrated approaches such as OH often use a social-ecological system (SES) framework that explicitly links health and ecosystem management with resilience, and the adaptive capacity of the actors and agents within SES, to prevent and cope with emerging health and environmental risks.” However, in an era where social media influencers and Artificial Intelligence have been used to generate manipulative disinformation, the need to build resilience against disinformation for key actors within this framework, and identify practical ways of proactively addressing the spread of fallacies at the community level is key. ABBC2025 aims to formulate actionable strategies and a toolkit to combat mis/disinformation. This will ultimately build a community of champions in defense of science and promote informed decision-making among actors and agents within the SES framework through effective communication.
The event will feature keynote addresses, thematic presentations, panel discussions, case studies, and exhibitions. It seeks to achieve the following objectives:
- To identify drivers of mis/disinformation on scientific innovations and their impact
- To critically examine the opportunity costs from underutilizing advanced innovative technologies in agriculture, health and for environmental protection and sustainability
- Co-create practical interventions to combat mis/disinformation in science.
Participants
Participants will comprise among others:
- Researchers
- Regulators
- Policy and decision makers
- Private sector
- Communication practitioners – media editors and journalists in traditional and new media, science communication experts and linguists
- Special interest groups- youth, women, PLWD
- Faith-based and community leaders
- Farmers
- Early-career scientists
- Digital content creators