Dr AI media incident — Sep 2026

What happened

Canadian physicians are increasingly being targeted by sophisticated deepfake campaigns that leverage their professional credibility to deceive the public. Dr. François Marquis, the chief of intensive care at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital in Montreal, and B.C. Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry have both discovered their likenesses and voices being used in AI-generated videos on social media platforms like Facebook. These fraudulent advertisements feature the doctors appearing to endorse various health products and medications, ranging from joint pain treatments to prostate remedies. In some instances, the AI-generated content has become increasingly bold, with deepfakes of Dr. Marquis even offering a $1 million guarantee to dissatisfied customers to entice potential victims.

For Dr. Henry, who became a widely recognized figure during the COVID-19 pandemic, the experience of seeing her likeness distorted to sell products she never endorsed has been described as disturbing. The physicians involved have expressed significant concern that these scams are not only defrauding patients of their money but also posing direct risks to public health and eroding the foundational trust between medical professionals and the community. Despite the clear harm caused by these impersonations, the affected doctors report that there is currently no clear or effective mechanism to ensure the rapid removal of these deepfake videos from social media platforms. The ease with which bad actors can synthesize these realistic videos has left medical professionals with little recourse as they struggle to combat the spread of misinformation using their own identities.