THE DEADLY RISE OF ANTI-SCIENCE

The title says it all, and the news is bad.

Hotez, a professor of pediatrics, molecular virology, and microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine and author of Preventing the Next Pandemic, has spent his life developing vaccines, mostly for poor nations. He also speaks and writes against the anti-vaccine movement. Especially since relocating to Texas a decade ago, this has subjected him to an avalanche of abusive emails and social media posts, heckling, denunciation in books, and even physical confrontations. In addition to disseminating misinformation about climate change and other issues, the anti-science movement proclaims that vaccines are a dangerous nostrum pushed by a corrupt medical establishment and oppressive government, so freedom lovers must push back. The author’s short, passionate polemic, dense with studies and charts, provides overwhelming evidence that scientific research benefits humanity and that vaccines are lifesavers. This hasn’t prevented anti-science movements from flourishing with enthusiastic support from both social and traditional media. Searching Amazon books for vaccine turns up a stream of diatribes. Perhaps most discouraging, anti-science has become politicized. Among the 200,000 unvaccinated Americans who died unnecessarily from Covid-19, Republicans dominate—and the redder the state, the higher the loss of life. According to a major study in early 2022, “70% more Trump voters than Biden voters have died of COVID since the 2020 election.” Hotez works hard to demonstrate his and fellow scientists’ honesty and disprove the movement’s outpouring of vicious attacks, but it’s unlikely readers will doubt their credentials since few anti-vaxxers are likely to pick up this book. The author points out the similarity between today’s extremists and those supporting Stalin’s and Hitler’s murderous attacks on scientists who deviated from the party line. Readers may not perk up as he concludes by urging scientists to speak out. Like many educators, Hotez believes that presenting the facts will convert people with deeply held false beliefs; unfortunately, numerous scientific studies have proven otherwise.

Supremely well-informed arguments that may not slow the anti-science movement.