If you are on substack, you probably follow a few other awesome physicians or scientists that are reporting the “other side” of the science of COVID-19. If you are twitter, you might follow some of those same brave scientists, and there have been others. A beautiful piece appeared in The Federalist, written by two brave epidemiologists, who don’t even mention themselves in that article, and they may have faced some of the worst attacks of any of them.
I bring you Exhibit A:
No, I don’t know how this leaked. But the implication is clear - Professors Bhattachayra and Kuldorff, who have incredible research programs, should be shut down.
This is the threat facing every academic scientist that speaks out against The Narrative. But the only reason it is effective is because those brave scientists are still in the minority. The writer of this substack is among those that has been vilified and threatened with all kinds of academic punishments.
Perhaps if more scientists and physicians stopped ignoring the obvious and stopped going along with the program, this would stop. Could Collins and Fauci threaten to hurt the funding of a couple of scientists? Maybe. But if more NIH-funded scientists started speaking out, or at least not lying down in blind compliance, these threats wouldn’t be as effective. Take out a few scientists, no one notices. Threaten dozens more? It wouldn’t happen.
My plea: Stop ignoring the data. If you are only taking the word of the government and health agencies, you aren’t doing your job as a scientist. Read some papers. Have a discussion with a scientist you disagree with - after all, that’s how science evolves, by having your paradigms challenged. Start by not attacking people whose views you don’t even understand because you haven’t taken time to read their papers or review their data. Stop making this about Trump (seriously). And maybe, just maybe, consider presenting another view of things. There are epidemiologists out there that have taken very balanced views of COVID-19. For example, they may be very much in support of the vaccine, but they also point out that the fear over omnicron isn’t justified by real-world data. It is possible to be objective.