Pod: Scientific Publishing’s Fauci Reckoning
Did our approach to Covid-19 publishing make the Fauci hearing possible?
Today, we want to talk about Anthony Fauci, and our role in making life difficult for him — and, beyond his current travails, for society at large.
In 2021, healthcare expert Paul Keckley noted five flaws in the response to Covid-19, three of which ended up at our doorstep:
- Covid-19 science has been compromised by political self-interests
- The influence of social media has been underestimated
- The scientific community has confused the public
The scientific publishing system was at the heart of what some called an “infodemic,” with hundreds of papers posted or published per day, most from inexpert research teams and nearly all from inexpert authors, part of the “more information will solve this faster” mentality.
When speed was prioritized over quality or relevance or even sound public health messaging, misinformation purveyors had a field day. Preprints dominated the news and were seen at the White House. The My Pillow guy started a Covid-19 grift with a preprint. The myocarditis myth was started with a bad preprint. Steve Bannon catalyzed the lab leak conspiracy with two preprints he funded. Fake information from anti-vaxxers and others went mainstream. And, worse, the seeds of MAHA were planted, created a beanstalk that RFK, Jr., and Jay Bhattacharya among others would climb to positions of power.
All of this — and more — undermined what could have been a good pandemic response if messaging had been consistent, uniform, and science-based and delivered mainly by trained public health leaders.
Instead, our eagerness to chase attention undermined these efforts while helping to make MAHA and empowering the very people who attacked Anthony Fauci recently.
It’s time to have this uncomfortable conversation — our Fauci reckoning.
We can’t make things better if we don’t accept that scientific publishing played a role in public health’s struggles to do right by us during a pandemic, in Fauci’s woes during that time and subsequently, and in society’s science-addressable problems ever since.
We end on a more cheerful note with our “Discoveries of the Week.”
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