“Poor prevention can even make you ill.” Who hasn’t seen eye-catching invitations to take advantage of prevention packages on billboards around town or in newsletters from diagnostic centers? Or hearing celebrities and public figures who, after receiving an alarming diagnosis, exhort their followers on social media to undergo regular check-ups?

It is now common belief that early diagnosis is always synonymous with prevention and that money “can buy, if not immortality, at least a very long life in good health.” Good prevention, on the other hand, is based on healthy habits and a few targeted checks, whose effectiveness has been proven by science. Healthcare consumerism is not only harmful to the patient’s psyche—who, in approaching prevention, should take into account the delicate relationship between risk and benefit—and to their wallet, but it is also, and above all, deleterious to public health, which risks collapsing under the weight of unnecessary demands.

Denouncing a system that exploits the legitimate fear of getting sick and the natural desire to feel good, Roberta Villa, journalist and science communicator, warns us about the risks of poor prevention, dismantling misconceptions and shedding light on the deliberate misunderstanding surrounding the meaning of this word.

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