On 19-03-2003, Jesse Alter wrote thusly :
I was checking out [[Hepatitis_B]] and noted a
prominent disclaimer in
red text:
*DISCLAIMER*
Please remember that Wikipedia is offered for informational use
only. The information is in most cases not reviewed by
professionals. You are advised to contact your doctor for
health-related decisions.
Should we be adding disclaimers like that to most of the articles? Do we
even need a disclaimer? If so, I think it should be somewhere else, like
on the front page, and not on each article we have. I can only imagine
seeing the big red disclaimer on [[Food Poisoning]],
[[Peyronie_disease]], [[Gingivitis]], [[Cancer]], and [[Chiropractic
medicine]] :-P
I thought of removing the disclaimer from each of the Hepatitis articles
but decided I should get a consensus here, first.
Jesse and all,
This is just the question whether Wikipedia is meant to be a reliable
reference source.
If not, it should be clearly stated that _no_ information is meant to be
taken seriously.
If yes, we must be prepared to be responsible for what we write here.
We cannot be sure that someone wouldn't take some misguided action reading
some joke put in by a vandal (even accessible for a short time to
readers).
Wikipedia could be available in print and all reliable printed sources give
such disclaimers. Not only to be on the safe side legally but to be
responsible to their readers.
Let's see to it that Wikipedia is not a health hazard.
Regards,
Kpjas.