You and I know we’ve all done it before, one quiet evening, scrolling through TikTok or X, and suddenly you stumble on a video that sounds really accurate. An influencer lists the “signs of ADHD,” and you start ticking boxes in your head. A thread explains “what anxiety feels like,” and suddenly every exciting moment or heartbeat feels like a diagnosis. In just a few minutes, you’ve gone from curious to convinced that something is wrong with you.
In our world today, it feels like everyone is living with one illness or the other. On social media, words like OCD, ADHD, depression, and anxiety are casually used to describe ordinary behaviors or passing emotions. Concurrently, hospitals see longer queues of people seeking help for conditions that might have gone unnoticed in the past. This raises a crucial question: are we truly getting sicker, or are we simply becoming more aware of what sickness looks like?
On one hand, there’s no denying how much progress the medical world has made. Awareness has never been higher. Conversations about mental health, access to information, and the evolution of modern diagnostics have changed the way people understand illness. Social media — once dismissed as a place for trends and entertainment — now doubles as a tool for health education. A single post, hashtag, or 30-second video can reach millions, educating people who may never attend a seminar or read a medical journal.
Beyond the screen, technology has equally reshaped healthcare. People no longer have to live for years without knowing exactly what is going on or the cause of their symptoms. With advanced tests and improved hospital tools, doctors can detect illnesses earlier and treat them more effectively. Public health campaigns now reach even rural communities, taking the information to people who might not even have access to the internet thus bridging the gap between access and awareness. Altogether, these changes have made illnesses more visible and honestly, visibility in many ways, is progress.
But there’s a troubling flip side. The same awareness that empowers can also mislead. In a world where everyone is a few clicks away from medical information, self-diagnosis has quietly become a trend. People slap medical labels on themselves based on what they see online — no tests, no consultations, just vibes and the fact that they are familiar. Someone who is simply tidy calls it OCD. Someone who’s distracted after a sleepless night assumes it’s ADHD. The intention might be harmless, but it trivializes real medical conditions that people are fighting daily.
We now live in an age of a digital clinic without doctors. Health threads, podcasts, and wellness influencers compete for attention and in the process, misinformation slips through. Only few people who learn about symptoms know how to process what they’ve learned. The result? Confusion, fear, and mismanagement of real health. People start self-medicating, rejecting professional advice, and trusting strangers on the internet over trained specialists. When results don’t match their self-diagnosis, they lose trust in medical systems and resort to their false assumptions.
Let’s be honest, some of these are emotional too. In this age of visibility, vulnerability has become some kind of social currency. The more open people are about their struggles, the more empathy they receive, which is quite beautiful in itself, but also unhealthy. Sickness, for a few, has become a way to belong, to be understood, to be seen. And in doing that the line between awareness and romanticizing illness starts to fade.
Sadly, the people who truly live with these conditions are the ones who suffer most. When everyone claims anxiety or depression, those genuinely battling it lose their voices in the crowd. Their pain become hashtags. Their reality becomes watered down. In our attempt to make every experience relatable, we sometimes strip real illnesses of their true meaning and weight.
Maybe the truth isn’t that we’re sicker, but that our society has changed. The older generation suffered in silence, they didn’t talk about it enough. But recently, we’ve become louder about our problems and perhaps too loud without full comprehension of it. Both extremes are dangerous because if we look closely, maybe it’s not our bodies or minds alone that are unwell. Maybe it’s the world itself — the pace, the pressure, the loneliness — that’s making us all show symptoms in different ways.
At the end of the day, awareness is beautiful. It has given people language, courage, and visibility. But awareness without responsibility is reckless. The real challenge isn’t just to keep speaking, but to speak with accuracy, honesty, and respect for those truly affected. The goal is not to silence the conversation, it’s to refine it
So, are we sicker? Not necessarily. What has changed is visibility powered by technology, information, and the freedom to speak openly. Stigma has lessened, voices have grown louder, and illness is recognized more readily. But awareness without responsibility is dangerous. Without accuracy, truth, and respect for those truly affected, the same awareness can do harm. The real work, then, lies not only in encouraging people to speak up but in teaching them to do so with accuracy, truth, and respect for the people truly living with these conditions