Google Rolls Back AI Overviews on Health-Related Searches

After a Guardian investigation revealed that Google AI Overviews were providing misleading information for certain health-related searches, the company has apparently removed these AI-generated summaries for some of those queries.

The Guardian initially reported that when users searched for "what is the normal range for liver blood tests," they received numerical ranges that failed to consider crucial factors like nationality, sex, ethnicity, or age. This could have led individuals to mistakenly believe their test results were within a healthy range when they were not.

The Guardian now reports that AI Overviews have been removed from search results for "what is the normal range for liver blood tests" and "what is the normal range for liver function tests." However, it found that alternative queries, such as "lft reference range" or "lft test reference range," could still trigger AI-generated summaries.

When testing these queries several hours after the Guardian's story was published, none of them produced AI Overviews, although Google still offered the option to submit the same query in AI Mode. In multiple instances, the top search result was the Guardian's own article about the removal.

A Google spokesperson informed the Guardian that the company does not "comment on individual removals within Search," but emphasized its commitment to "make broad improvements." The spokesperson also noted that an internal team of clinicians had reviewed the queries highlighted by the Guardian and determined that "in many instances, the information was not inaccurate and was also supported by high quality websites."

TechCrunch has contacted Google for further comment. Last year, the company introduced new features designed to enhance Google Search for healthcare applications, including improved overviews and AI models specifically trained for health information.

Vanessa Hebditch, Director of Communications and Policy at the British Liver Trust, told the Guardian that the removal is "excellent news," but added, "Our bigger concern with all this is that it is nit-picking a single search result and Google can just shut off the AI Overviews for that but it’s not tackling the bigger issue of AI Overviews for health."

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