Couldn't agree with you more about the overall, critical misstep in public messaging. But it's hard for me to believe they could have done much-much better without hindsight.
How do you communicate critical pandemic information to millions of people in THIS political environment in an election year? Under THAT president? It had to be painfully tricky.
The pandemic was so sudden and life-altering. I will never forget when they cancelled March Madness, the NBA playoffs, Wimbledon, and then the *Olympics*. I fear the public's reaction if we have another moment like that any time soon. If we think conspiracy theories are off the charts now--and they are--imagine what they would look like then.
Of course, mistakes were made; that was more or less inevitable. I recall a moment early on when an American and Korean doctor were interviewed simultaneously on CNN: They unexpectedly butted heads about masks. It was surreal; the Korean doctor held the more mandatory position.
Only weeks later, the US shifted toward the Korean's position. That's how touch-and-go it was.
People were dying and the world was reacting at every level in real time.
How does that justify shutting down science? Covid-19 was a new disease, and that provides a good reason to perform scientific testing. There were a series of issues for which Fauci asserted that he was sure of the answer, and he tried to prevent scientific research on those topics. Here are some examples:
1. Some scientists, including Jay Bhattacharya, said that covid-19 seemed to be much worse for the elderly. Fauci denied this, and he called people who believed it "fringe scientists".
2. Fauci thought that the spread of covid-19 would be so limited that contact tracing could be used. When others, such as Jay Bhattacharya and John Ioannidis, tested people to determine if Fauci was right, Fauci and the MSM denounced them.
3. Fauci asserted that cloth masks would be effective in preventing the spread of covid-19, and he blocked funding to test this. When a Danish study found that cloth masks were not effective, Fauci and the Biden Administration tried to block these results from being communicated on social media. Since that time, Wolensky and Jha have promoted several fraudulent studies on masking, which have been debunked by Vinay Prasad, Marty Makary, and others.
4. Fauci and Wolensky asserted that anyone who was vaccinated for covid-19 would not get covid-19. Information released via the Freedom of Information Act indicates that Fauci and Wolensky knew that this was not true, but they knew that the MSM would support their position.
5. Fauci, Wolensky, and Peter Hotez asserted that immunity acquired by getting covid-19 was less than one would get from being vaccinated. This was shown to be untrue by Monica Gandhi, Vinay Prasad, and Francois Balloux
I could provide many more examples. Fauci and his allies have tried to block scientific information to cover-up Fauci's incompetence and his politicizing of the pandemic.
I don't think anything justifies shutting down science.
That said, I would love to hear Jay and others like him in a public conversation with colleagues they respect, but who disagree.
I don't recall Dr. Fauci being quite as doctrinaire as you describe, but even if he was, it might speak to the dilemma of being a public health messenger in a polarized political environment.
Unless Fauci was in fact acting in bad faith (which is a hell of an accusation), what other options did he have, practically speaking? If I am the authority figure for the nation in a moment like that, I would think the worst thing I could do is be consistently vague or confusing, especially in an environment rife with people who think I am part of some vast conspiracy.
Oh I agree! Just feel they could have done better. An example, once they knew the virus was aerosolized, I heard *once* a person explain aerosols could be thought to move like cigarette smoke. People have an intuitive sense of how smoke fills a room, and how important ventilation is etc. Another was an article in Washington Post (and no where else) where they broke down what made an effective cloth mask, that you couldn’t see light through it and that if you inhaled/exhaled deeply you couldn’t feel much air movement outside the mask. They also said two layers of tight woven cotton and one of a non woven with some more specifics of materials… back when people were still wearing bandanas and gaiters. Messaging like that would not have been hard, but would have added a lot of clarity.
Looking back, it's kind of dizzying, isn't it?
Couldn't agree with you more about the overall, critical misstep in public messaging. But it's hard for me to believe they could have done much-much better without hindsight.
How do you communicate critical pandemic information to millions of people in THIS political environment in an election year? Under THAT president? It had to be painfully tricky.
The pandemic was so sudden and life-altering. I will never forget when they cancelled March Madness, the NBA playoffs, Wimbledon, and then the *Olympics*. I fear the public's reaction if we have another moment like that any time soon. If we think conspiracy theories are off the charts now--and they are--imagine what they would look like then.
Of course, mistakes were made; that was more or less inevitable. I recall a moment early on when an American and Korean doctor were interviewed simultaneously on CNN: They unexpectedly butted heads about masks. It was surreal; the Korean doctor held the more mandatory position.
Only weeks later, the US shifted toward the Korean's position. That's how touch-and-go it was.
People were dying and the world was reacting at every level in real time.
How does that justify shutting down science? Covid-19 was a new disease, and that provides a good reason to perform scientific testing. There were a series of issues for which Fauci asserted that he was sure of the answer, and he tried to prevent scientific research on those topics. Here are some examples:
1. Some scientists, including Jay Bhattacharya, said that covid-19 seemed to be much worse for the elderly. Fauci denied this, and he called people who believed it "fringe scientists".
2. Fauci thought that the spread of covid-19 would be so limited that contact tracing could be used. When others, such as Jay Bhattacharya and John Ioannidis, tested people to determine if Fauci was right, Fauci and the MSM denounced them.
3. Fauci asserted that cloth masks would be effective in preventing the spread of covid-19, and he blocked funding to test this. When a Danish study found that cloth masks were not effective, Fauci and the Biden Administration tried to block these results from being communicated on social media. Since that time, Wolensky and Jha have promoted several fraudulent studies on masking, which have been debunked by Vinay Prasad, Marty Makary, and others.
4. Fauci and Wolensky asserted that anyone who was vaccinated for covid-19 would not get covid-19. Information released via the Freedom of Information Act indicates that Fauci and Wolensky knew that this was not true, but they knew that the MSM would support their position.
5. Fauci, Wolensky, and Peter Hotez asserted that immunity acquired by getting covid-19 was less than one would get from being vaccinated. This was shown to be untrue by Monica Gandhi, Vinay Prasad, and Francois Balloux
I could provide many more examples. Fauci and his allies have tried to block scientific information to cover-up Fauci's incompetence and his politicizing of the pandemic.
I don't think anything justifies shutting down science.
That said, I would love to hear Jay and others like him in a public conversation with colleagues they respect, but who disagree.
I don't recall Dr. Fauci being quite as doctrinaire as you describe, but even if he was, it might speak to the dilemma of being a public health messenger in a polarized political environment.
Unless Fauci was in fact acting in bad faith (which is a hell of an accusation), what other options did he have, practically speaking? If I am the authority figure for the nation in a moment like that, I would think the worst thing I could do is be consistently vague or confusing, especially in an environment rife with people who think I am part of some vast conspiracy.
Oh I agree! Just feel they could have done better. An example, once they knew the virus was aerosolized, I heard *once* a person explain aerosols could be thought to move like cigarette smoke. People have an intuitive sense of how smoke fills a room, and how important ventilation is etc. Another was an article in Washington Post (and no where else) where they broke down what made an effective cloth mask, that you couldn’t see light through it and that if you inhaled/exhaled deeply you couldn’t feel much air movement outside the mask. They also said two layers of tight woven cotton and one of a non woven with some more specifics of materials… back when people were still wearing bandanas and gaiters. Messaging like that would not have been hard, but would have added a lot of clarity.