Astrophysicist and famed science communicator Neil deGrasse Tyson appeared on The Highwire, an antivax video podcast, to “debate” its host, antivax propagandist Del Bigtree. This incident demonstrates quite well why it is almost never a good idea for a scientist to agree to “debate” science deniers.
Misrepresentation of VAERS reports has been a longstanding antivaccine propaganda technique. Now Del Bigtree has gotten his hands on V-Safe, the system created to track adverse events after COVID-19 vaccination. The results are, predictably, disinformation.
Before the pandemic, antivaxxers likened concern about childhood diseases to mental illness. In the age of COVID-19, Dr. Vinay Prasad accuses medicine of “legitimizing” irrational anxiety and says we should treat COVID like the flu—with one telling omission.
An old school “vaccines cause autism” antivaxxer hosted new COVID-19 antivaxxers at an antivax conference last month. Although one new antivaxxer, Geert Vanden Bossche, was discomfited and pushed back against old antivax tropes, the rest joined Del Bigtree in spewing longstanding antivax tropes.
Efforts to hold COVID-19 disinformation-spreading physicians accountable are leading to increasing calls by cranks for a “debate” with them. This is a disinformation tactic, not an honest call for debate.
