This nurse is using TikTok to spread dangerous misinformation about STIs and people are outraged

For better or worse, TikTok is now a fully fledged feature in our social media consciousness.

It launched the career of Lil Nas X, created a new generation of influencers and even journalists working at big broadcasters like the BBC are using it.

But the important thing to note about TikTok is that most of its users are young. In fact, 41 per cent of TikTokers are aged between 16 and 24 and 90 per cent of these Gen Z users say they open their app at least once a day.

Which means when misinformation spreads, it’s spreading to a young and impressionable audience.

Enter ‘Nurse Holly’.

Holly Grace, who goes under the handle ‘Nurse Holly’ on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, seems to genuinely be a nurse IRL.

But she’s also a social media influencer, who had around 400,000 thousand followers on TikTok prior to this week (they now number over a million).

The number has since shot up – because Holly made an 18-second video (now-deleted) showing her smiling and pointing as words appeared around her, reading “The best way to prevent STIs is waiting for sex until marriage. Just the truth”.

The clip quickly went viral but not for the reasons Holly expected.

Social media users complained that the video appeared as if a healthcare professional was shaming individuals who contracted STDs outside of marriage and helped amplify a culture of stigma surrounding STIs – which doesn’t do anything to stop rates of transmission.

Reports have also suggested that abstinence programmes don’t do anything to lower rates of STIs spreading or unexpected pregnancy – they just mean young people aren’t educated on how to deal with those things.

Users also pointed out that people don’t always have the choice of abstinence in cases of sexual assault and rape.

Grace’s clip was particularly galling, given how young TikTok audiences skew.

But it seems she intended it that way. In a statement to Business Insider Grace apologised but also said she wanted to help “little girls” see that saving sex for a single partner has “certain benefits”and calling it a “healthy lifestyle” (what if they’re crap in bed Holly?).

"I understand that my voice will not be accepted by many as it's an unpopular view, this video was simply created with the intention of helping little girls see that saving sex for one partner may have certain benefits," she said. "I do truly apologize for any offense that was taken as I only wish to promote positivity and healthy lifestyles."

However, a Twitter user claimed that ‘Nurse’ Holly may not even be practicing anymore – as she no longer appears to work at the place she gives as her professional base on social media.

But where there is darkness, there is light. In response to Nurse Holly’s video, people have started boosting another TikTok clip created by a doctor called Danielle Manalo (@eatroamheal).

The 11-second clip shows Manalo dancing in a similar way to Holly but the words surrounding her instead advise teens watching that they can see a doctor for confidential sexual health advice, contraception, pregnancy tests and STI treatment without their parents being informed.

And people are loving it.

Repeat after us: it’s the LAW.

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