Public health measures that have saved lives are not to blame for anti-vax sentiments; what happened is a disinformation campaign and a lack of a proper public health campaign against it.
And yet, Paul Offit wrongly blamed “lockdowns” for anti-vax disinformation operations funded by dark money. Seriously. Paul Offit has been peddling pure & simple right-wing lockdown revisionism. He’s legitimizing the claim that public health measures are what have driven low vaccination rates. For “public mistrust” in healthcare or public health, he blamed social distancing, something he previously endorsed over all other mitigations including vaccines. Maybe he should recognize he’s part of the reason people don’t trust doctor pundits; because he has repeatedly undermined vaccines while he’s all over the map and inconsistent. Paul Offit also blamed masks as well with a little anti-mask woke-washing. And made it sound like recommending people test in 2020 for a dangerous disease that was killing people at an astounding rate and leading to freezer truck morgues was out of line and over the top. He also innuendoed that closing the schools was the wrong choice even though more children died after they re-opened the schools and dropped masks than in 2020.
I can’t say I’m surprised because I haven’t trusted Paul Offit in years because he’s been trying to restrict the covid vaccines for years, and actually was outspoken in lobbying the Biden administration for even more narrow restrictions the Trump administration is doing now, and he’s even undermined RSV vaccines too. But it’s really bonkers level gaslighting in his blog now, because he puts this misinformation decoy in a piece that is supposedly criticizing right-wing nonsense and supposedly in opposition to Marty Makary and Vinay Prassad; but then Paul Offit reiterates and solidifies this assertion that public health measures early in the pandemic were the direct cause of anti-vax sentiments instead of debunking those right-wing nonsense claims. And stating the truth: that there was a dark money deep pocket fossil fuel connected campaign against all public health measures and a huge amount of money fueling anti-vax marketing.
So what is he doing here?
If you’re not citing the huge anti-vax disinformation campaigns, you’re doing science communication wrong. Why is Paul Offit legitimizing right-wing dark money funded propaganda? Are we really supposed to believe that Paul Offit doesn’t read the news?
Not surprised Paul Offit doesn’t listen to CDC ACIP meeting public comments. But I mentioned our own US DOD perpetrated anti-vax disinformation campaign in my public comment to the CDC ACIP committee in June 2024. And in October 2024 at the CDC ACIP meeting, my public comment mentioned then Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his testimony about known anti-vax disinformation campaigns targeting all of North America.