Eating disorder nonprofit NEDA pulls its AI chatbot after it told a user to cut 500 to 1,000 calories a day

The National Eating Disorders Association took down its chatbot Tessa after it handed a user "healthy eating tips" that included a daily calorie deficit of 500 to 1,000 calories plus weekly weighing and measuring. Activist Sharon Maxwell posted the exchange on Instagram: "If I had accessed this chatbot when I was in the throes of my eating disorder, I would NOT have gotten help for my ED. If I had not gotten help, I would not still be alive today." NEDA's own figures say moderate dieters are five times more likely to develop an eating disorder, and extreme restrictors 18 times more likely.

Tessa arrived two months after NEDA fired four helpline employees who had just won union certification. Their union, Helpline Associates United, has filed unfair labor practice charges with the NLRB. CEO Liz Thompson said the helpline closure was a business decision three years in the making, that the chatbot was a separate program, and that it is "not a highly functional AI system." About 2,500 people had used it. Tessa was built with chatbot maker Cass AI and psychology researchers, including Washington University's Ellen Fitzsimmons-Craft, who wrote that prevention programs requiring human time are "difficult to scale."