The question is why career scientists are being sidelined by this man?

thread. related, my impression is a lot of higher ed administrators are significantly oriented toward making a mark on an institution in the short term so they have a claimable on their CV to get their next admin job elsewhere. that incentivizes vandalizing institutions, whether by AI or otherwise

The man is the #1 public health menace in the United States. Measles comes in second place. At least measles can’t destroy the entire vaccine effort in the United States. RFK Jr can and is doing so.

For my latest @opinion.bloomberg.com, wrote about FDA's disastrous decision--or, really, it seems Vinay Prasad's singular choice--to turn away Moderna's flu vaccine application without a review. The problem is much bigger than this one vaccine. (🎁 link):

Whether or not the story is apocryphal, I fear many of my colleagues who work in DC and are advocates for biomedical research and public health, do not get the nature of the "inside-outside" strategy. 1/ dissentmagazine.org/online_artic...

The US administration is going to kill its people while they cheer. In January, Moderna’s announced the company will no longer invest in new Phase 3 vaccine trials for infectious diseases: “You cannot make a return on investment if you don’t have access to the U.S. market.” 1/4

Name names. Marty Makary, Vinay Prasad, Jay Bhattacharya, Tracy Beth Hoeg, Martin Kulldorff, Russell Vought, RFK Jr., Donald Trump. All of them contributed to this by their relentless attacks on vaccines and biomedical R&D.

In terms of what cures are being lost: - Epstein-Barr virus is perhaps the major trigger for multiple sclerosis - herpes simplex virus causes cold sores, genital herpes, infections in babies, deadly meningitis - shingles virus causes an intensely painful disease

NIH, CDC, HHS, and all of US cancer research and public health needed and still needs protection from Russell Vought and the P2025 White House. The defining feature of 2025 at NIH was not merely grant changes. It was unprecedented levels of presidential interference with NIH decision-making. 1/

Joe Kahn: what do you think you’re doing? Again bending over backwards to rationalize this stuff.

You can't... repeal... a scientific finding. At that point it's just called lying about it.

👀

[If I do this, it generally means Colin did something smart and important that I don't understand but that my science reporter friends might and so they should look. Don't tell Colin I said something nice about him, though, please and thank you.]

This is EXACTLY right RFK Jr and the MDs and PhDs he hired to follow his orders—Drs Prasad, Bhattacharya, Høeg, Kulldorff, Oz, & Makary—have been hugely successful at rapidly dismantling the US vaccine system & at discouraging vaccine R&D (including mRNA vaccine R&D)

Doing drugs, formerly doing drugs, being addicted to drugs. None of these makes you a bad person. Being RFK makes you a bad person

Oh my God, look at these personnel complaints filed against Vinay Prasad: sexual harassment, retaliation against subordinates, & verbally berating staff.

"There is grandeur in this view of life - that from so simple a beginning, endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved." Happy birthday to the only and only Charles Darwin. 🧪

We now have a CDC grant tracker and are collecting information on CDC terminations. If your CDC grant was terminated, we need your help to gather data and documents! Please report! grant-witness.us/submit-cdc.h...

Here is an announcement for everybody who is sick and tired on the attacks on science and scientists. It has been months in the making, but now we are ready to fight back. First episode airs tomorrow 5pm UK. New episode every friday. Incredible guests lined up. open.substack.com/pub/protagon...

Fuentes, yesterday: “Our #1 political enemy is women because women constrain everything, every conversation, every man, everything. They have to be imprisoned. They are the ones that are hurting the fertility rate. They're the ones making us sympathetic to poor people, which are also brown people.”

Democratic politicians who were too busy doing triangulation to speak plainly about Trump share some part of the responsibility here

Our amicus in AAP v. Kennedy. Thanks to Wendy Parmet at Northeastern and Dorit Reiss at University of San Francisco for making this happen. You can find our amicus here: litigationtracker.law.georgetown.edu/litigation/a...

It’s hard to recall a regulator who has done as much damage to medical innovation in as little time as Vinay Prasad” www.wsj.com/opinion/vina...

I have no idea what he’s doing.

In today's The Ethicist: Is it wrong to steal a pet dog from a 4-year-old orphan who's devastated by his parent's murder-suicide, and who lost the dog during Hurricane Katrina, and who begs you to give him back his dog?

So grandma, when authoritarianism came, what did the media do? Well, honey, they framed everything as a battle between two sides, and never actually said one side was undermining the rule of law, damaging institutions, and creating a new Fash Tech Oligarchy™️ that was unaccountable to the people.

You can joke about Pam Bondi’s ridiculous unprofessionalism all you want, but I’m deeply shocked by it: She acts as if she fears absolutely no consequences, convinced that there will be no more political power transfers. — This should shake everyone to their core.

"These Gestapo officers need to be properly trained!" Chuck Schumer, 1936

Vinay Prasad is a dangerous fool who has for too long been high on his own supply.

"Societies experiencing atrocities struggle to put a stop to and then meaningfully address them. Perpetrators want to advance their aims to the end and propagate baseless lies to do it. Victims want violence to stop, and they want justice." 1/ www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/o...

Ashish Jha is a “say anything to stay in the good graces of power” kind of guy. He played the same game under Biden and it’s why that administration brought him in to greenlight their push for COVID normalcy.

Ashish Jha the former dean of Brown School of Public Health now at Harvard can’t help but suck up to power in his quest for attention and relevance. Here @matthewcort.land documents Dr. Oz’s record. I am so tired of liberals shilling for the right. www.patreon.com/posts/ozs-re...

NEW via me and @alejacorazonhm.bsky.social: Cardinal Blase Cupich, who runs the Archdiocese of Chicago, says that DHS has stopped priests under his purview and demanded proof of citizenship “because of their color.” religionnews.com/2026/02/10/c...

It is absolutely outrageous that Moderna’s flu vaccine was met with a “refusal-to-file” even after their approved their protocol with FDA and carried out the trial as agreed. This vaccine works better in older adults than the current flu vaccines. apnews.com/article/mode...

Read the section on the NIH in the Heritage Foundation's dystopian Project 2025 It's really stunning how closely the Trump-loving MAGA hero Jay Bhattacharya has followed the Project 2025 vision Surely this is why Trump hired him: to be a faithful collaborator in dismantling science/public health

Reminder: It has been a very bad flu season. Undercutting flu vaccination is a perfect Trump Administration special combination of stupid and dangerous.

interviewed Ramirez about her plans to dismantle DHS, abolish ICE, and put money towards housing and health care for communities ICE is terrorizing. www.publicnotice.co/p/delia-rami...

Rep. Delia Ramirez to DHS officials: "I have as much respect for you as I do for the last white men who put on masks to terrorize communities of color. I have no respect for the inheritors of the Klanhood and the slave patrol. Those activities were criminal and so are yours."

I’m pleased my family—including our 10 year old son—is up to date on our flu vaccine It was so sad to see RFK Jr drop the recommendation that all kids get vaccinated It was horrific & dystopian to hear him say it may be “better” if fewer kids got vaccinated (www.cbsnews.com/news/rfk-jr-...)

Vinay Prasad will defend your right to drink raw milk. That's freedom. With vaccines, he decides for the entire country. He controls our health.

If you don’t understand the difference between abortion being an individual decision that affects only oneself & vaccine refusal being a public health choice that affects herd immunity & thus the health of your community, you have zero fucking business working in, let alone overseeing public health.

I genuinely cannot believe the degree to which we are pissing away this generational breakthrough, even given the fuckmuppets who are involved www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...

The purpose is to disincentivize investments in vaccine development

Marty Makary is an anti-science crank.

In the absence of real oversight, we will continue to bear the costs of an administration that privileges ideology over evidence: increased risk of disease, narrowing scope for discovery and innovation, and reduced economic activity. Grievance has its consequences.

This is insane. Marty Makary, Vinay Prasad, Tracy Beth Hoeg and RFK Jr are a collective menace.

"“It is concerning that H.H.S. is cutting public health funding to local communities that cover core functions in the middle of a measles outbreak and other health threats,” she said. “This coupled with large staffing cuts to federal public health leaves communities less prepared.”"

These are concentration camps. kfoxtv.com/news/local/i...

More dog on ice. Second photo is offshore--water is frozen out to the channel.