David Gorski, MD, PhD Profile picture
Apr 4, 2021 24 tweets 7 min read Read on X
What most pundits, scientists, and doctors don't realize is that this is not a new alliance. Rather, it's the fruition of an effort by antivaxxers to court the far right. It started by portraying school vaccine mandates as an unacceptable government assault on "freedom." 1/
Contrary to the view of many who always thought that the antivax movement was all hippy dippy crunchy lefties, antivax beliefs have always been roughly equally prevalent on the right and the left. Even @iamsambee got this wrong years ago. 2/ respectfulinsolence.com/2014/06/04/the…
Indeed, there has long been a strong right-wing conspiratorial wing of the antivaccine movement, dating back at least to the John Birch Society. Anyone ever hear of General Bert Stubblebine III’s Natural Solutions Foundation? 3/
Then there was Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN), the longtime powerful @indgop pol who used to use his position as chair of the Oversight Committee to call @CDCgov officials to testify about a "vaccine-autism" link. 4/ respectfulinsolence.com/2012/11/23/rep…
Let's get to more recent history. A decade ago, antivaxxers started reaching out to the newly ascendant Tea Party with messages that vaccine mandates were an example of excessive government regulation that should be opposed. 5/
By 2013, antivaxxers were contributing heavily to @DarrellIssa's Congressional campaign. 6/ respectfulinsolence.com/2013/09/18/the…
.@DarrellIssa, for his part, returned the favor by continuing Burton's legacy of abusing his chair to call @CDCgov officials before his committee to ask them why CDC wasn't investigating "vaccine injury." 7/ respectfulinsolence.com/2012/12/04/the…
From there, the courting of the right by antivaxxers continued. In 2016, antivaxxers courted @jasoninthehouse and other @GOP heavyweights at the federal level to "investigate @CDCgov." 8/ respectfulinsolence.com/2016/06/22/ant…
Meanwhile, in my state, @delbigtree, along with @MI4VaxChoice and other antivaxxers, descended on the Michigan State House. Unfortunately, they had a fairly warm reception from @MIGOP. 9/ respectfulinsolence.com/2016/10/28/nob…
What really turbocharged the alliance between antivaxxers and the right, though, was the battle by @DrPanMD and pro-vaccine politicians to pass SB277, the California law that eliminated nonmedical exemptions to school vaccine mandates in 2015. 10/
Then came Donald Trump, which took the seeds of right wing antivaccine activism that had been germinating the last few years and laid a ton of fertilizer on it. 11/
By the time Trump became President, even though the prevalence of antivaccine views still remained roughly the same on the right and left, the *activist* wing of the antivaccine movement had shifted markedly right. 12/
Antivaxxers in MI, for example, started promoting "make measles great again" bills; for example, this one if passed would have neutered the ability of @MichiganHHS to develop new rules to improve vaccine uptake and hamstringed local health officials. 13/ respectfulinsolence.com/2017/04/05/why…
Antivaxxers also pushed bills that would have required bogus "informed consent" about "fetal parts" in vaccines. 14/ respectfulinsolence.com/2018/06/12/sen…
Meanwhile, @ohiogop and @ohiogopsenate became rife with antivaxxers, to the point where antivaxxers bragged about how many allies they had in the Ohio State House. 15/ respectfulinsolence.com/2019/11/13/ohi…
This sort of thing has been going on all over the country, with @GOP either pandering to, playing footsie with, or overtly embracing the antivaccine movement. 16/ respectfulinsolence.com/2019/04/19/gop…
Basically, what happened is that "freedom" and "parental rights" were the "in" that antivaxxers used to entice the right. Once the alliance was made, then, though, the right proved as open to antivax conspiracy theories as it has been to #QAnonCult. 17/ sciencebasedmedicine.org/covid-19-pande…
That's why, once the #COVID19 #pandemic began, unsurprisingly, antivaxxers rapidly allied themselves with antimaskers and COVID cranks to oppose all public health interventions to slow the spread of the pandemic. 18/ respectfulinsolence.com/2020/12/02/ant…
It was thus a natural progression that right wing propaganda organs disguised as "think tanks" like @aier, with flacks like @PhilWMagness and @naomirwolf, have promoted #COVID19 misinformation under the guise of "freedom" and combatting "tyranny." 19/
Add to that grifters like Scott Atlas of @HooverInst, more right wing propagandists disguised as a "think tank" (but one using its affiliation with @Stanford to gain the patina of academic credibility), and the activist wing of the antivaccine movement is firmly right wing. 20/
As a result, "freedom," "parental rights," etc., are now dog whistles for the antivaccine movement and, more recently, for antimaskers and #COVID19 cranks. 21/ respectfulinsolence.com/2015/02/20/blo…
And, yes, it is true that there are left-wing antivaxxers, such as @RobertKennedyJr, but, unlike the case on the right, they do not have nearly the reach and they are marginalized by @TheDemocrats, not celebrated. 22/ respectfulinsolence.com/2016/08/01/jil…
Unfortunately, this embrace of antivaccine messages by the right and populist movements has real and very negative consequences, as we have seen over the last year or so. 23/23
Forgot to mention, here's an example of the sort of politician that's embraced antivaccine views. He was my state senator for eight years. 23a/23

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More from @gorskon

Sep 8
.@jeffreyatucker was the @aier hack who managed to bring together three contrarian laptop class scientists to write the #GreatBarringtonDeclaration in October 2020, a document that advocated letting the virus rip through the working class to achieve "natural herd immunity." 1/
It was a profoundly social Darwinist idea in which the working class would have to keep functioning normally (living with a higher risk of suffering and maybe dying from COVID), so that they could become immune and contribute to "natural herd immunity." 2/ sciencebasedmedicine.org/great-barringt…
Sure, the GBD also advocated "focused protection" of the elderly and those with chronic diseases who were most at risk for severe disease and death due to COVID, but that "focused protection" was never well defined in a way that could be operationalized.3/ sciencebasedmedicine.org/brownstone-ins…
Read 12 tweets
Oct 23, 2023
Some recent prepandemic history: Antivaxxers blamed residual DNA in HPV vaccines for all sorts of autoimmune diseases. They claimed that the DNA passed the blood-brain barrier, got into neurons, and then led to the production of nonself proteins that caused autoimmune responses.
That autoimmune response was blamed for autism. (Never mind that the age at which children get HPV vaccines is way past the age at which autism is most commonly diagnosed.) Just Google "homologous recombinaltion tiniker" if you don't believe me.
Or, just check out my post from 2011, when I discuss an antivax "review article" where the hilarious typo that is "homologous recombinaltion tiniker" appeared as the author tried to make this case about "fetal DNA" in Gardasil and autoimmunity. respectfulinsolence.com/2011/04/05/the…
Read 7 tweets
Aug 2, 2023
Antivaxxers have long made exactly the same sorts of accusations against scientists they don’t like. Conspiracy theorists labor under the delusion that NIH funding is strictly quid pro quo, rather than based on scientific merit as determined by rigorous study section review.
The @NRO op-ed to which he's responding is pure conspiracy theory. Just because #lableak is a *possible* explanation for #COVID19, that does not make it likely or evidence-based, nor does it render the story spun by NRO any less a conspiracy theory.
@NRO Another thing conspiracy theorists like @NRO like to do is to put way too much emphasis on one study or paper, either beloved (e.g., Andrew Wakefield's case series) or hated (e.g., proximal origins) and portray it as the be-all and end-all of evidence for or against a conclusion.
Read 19 tweets
Aug 1, 2023
The real subtext is, of course, the same message promoted by charlatans throughout history: Don’t trust *them*. Trust *me*.
I wonder if @VPrasadMDMPH knows that @nickgillespie has long advocated the dismantling of @US_FDA because, like a lot of deluded libertarians, he thinks it’s keeping life saving drugs from the people when in reality its approval standards have slipped. thedailybeast.com/kill-the-fda-b…
Back in 2014 he viewed the threat of Ebola as a means of pushing his FDA-hostile libertarian agenda. He must really love #COVID19. thedailybeast.com/the-upside-of-…
Read 10 tweets
Jul 3, 2023
Once again, @RobertKennedyJr has resurrected the deceptive antivax claim that most childhood #vaccines have never been tested in randomized controlled trials with #Saline #placebo control to portray vaccines as unsafe (or at least as inadequately tested). sciencebasedmedicine.org/rfk-jr-resurre…
Crossover study designs, how do they work?🙄🤦🏻‍♂️
@J_MeD_ @RobertKennedyJr I myself have been in a similar position, not from RFK Jr. criticizing me, but from Mike Adams publishing something like 40+ defamatory articles about me on his website over the course of 2016.
Read 8 tweets
Jun 27, 2023
Reporters, now ask @RobertKennedyJr and his spokespeople this question at every event. EVERY EVENT! Don't let them weasel out of answering like this. Hammer them with this question every time they complain about being called "antivaccine."
Use the tactic that I've been advocating for many years now. It frustrates the hell out of me that so few reporters use this very simple technique when interviewing RFK Jr. respectfulinsolence.com/2022/12/05/wha…
Start out with the question that @JohnGHendy asked. I've even been suggesting followups since 2010, as well as clever answers that more wary antivaxxers might give.

Read 11 tweets

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