Twitter and Google blocked ads from a medical journal about health and racism

Illustration by Alex Castro / The VergeThe medical journal Health Affairs spent years planning its special issue on health and racism, which it published at the beginning of February. The journal wanted to reach new readers by promoting the issue through targeted advertisements on Twitter and YouTube.
That’s why it was so frustrating when Twitter and Google blocked its ads before they could go up, says Patti Sweet, the director of digital strategy at Health Affairs. The journal’s Google ads account was also suspended. Sweet wrote a blog post outlining that frustration last week, saying she thought the use of the word “racism” was the trigger for the rejections.
But Twitter and Google say the ad rejections didn’t have to do with the language around racism — rather, they were…

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