Health Information Consumers Can't Or Don't Want to Use (Editorial POSTLUDE‪)‬

As a consumer education issue, health literacy asks what is needed for people to make rational informed decisions. As a consumer protection issue, it questions what information consumers can or would use and how they might use it. Unfortunately, health decisions by their basic nature often can involve information consumers can't or won't use, and no amount of education can help consumers where even the experts' knowledge might be uncertain. Too often, the plethora of health-based decisions become emotional reactions where the hypothetical curves of information frustration and shopping exhaustion meet. **********