If you’ve ever wondered why posts about periods, pregnancy, or anatomy seem to disappear from your feed, it’s not just a glitch—the vibes are off for a lot of women’s health accounts. Businesses, charities, and creators are sounding the alarm that social media algorithms are hitting them with 'shadowbans' and sensitivity filters for content that is, well, just normal health education.
Why is this happening?
Business owner Irene Breen found out the hard way when her pregnancy pillow company got hit with major restrictions. She was told by Meta that even the word 'pregnancy' was a red flag for their ad system. She had to scrub the term from her entire site just to keep her business afloat. Real talk: it cost her a massive financial hit.
It’s not just brands, either. The Eve Appeal, a charity focusing on gynaecological cancer, shared an anatomical diagram about vulval health—and it got pulled. Another fertility brand had a video of a woman just talking about her endometriosis pain removed and classified as 'political content.'
The AI problem
Dr. Carolina Are, a digital criminologist at the London School of Economics, explains that these platforms rely heavily on AI to moderate content. The issue? Algorithms are prone to 'misdetecting' normal health info as sexual activity or nudity, and once that label sticks, it’s lowkey impossible to get a human to review it.
This is creating a real-world problem. Many people rely on these accounts to learn about symptoms they wouldn't otherwise discuss with a doctor. Because of the constant flagging, many creators are now self-censoring, using weird spellings like 'seggs' or just avoiding topics entirely to bypass the sensors.
Why it matters
When health info gets suppressed, people lose out on life-saving knowledge. Charities are pushing for these platforms to stop treating women's health like it's a violation of community guidelines. While companies like Meta and TikTok say they are working on it, creators say the current systems are an obstacle course that makes it nearly impossible to reach their audience. It's giving major overreach, and honestly, the censorship is doing more harm than good.
