Dean Giustini's UBC Google Scholar Blog has an interesting post, Google Health and/ or Medicine - Has the Portal Craze Begun?

"Health librarians take note: Google is considering a health portal similar to what I
described here. Adam Bosworth has been appointed chief architect for a Google spinoff known only as Google Health. But be aware - according to sources, we are entering a whole new search era, and this is just the start of the vortal craze."

Do you think consumers or researchers even want a health search engine/portal? Or are they just happy to be using generic Google or Google Scholar to look for medical and health information? Or do you think that there hasn't been a "good" (I use that term very loosely) medical/health portal to lure consumers in great numbers yet, and that is why many just plug away at the traditional search engines? Once a "good" one is created they will go to it, sort of the Internet version of Field of Dreams, "if you build it they will come." Of course there are medical/health portals out there like MammaHealth and HealthLine and I have yet to see any great migration from traditional search engines to these sites. So do you think it might be, "If Google builds it they will come?"

I am not saying there isn't medical/health portal craze, because these sites are starting to pop up like spring flowers all over the Internet. I am just wondering how much of the general public searches them compared to searching regular search engines for medical information. Just curious.