In a pattern akin to the respect demanded of high priests, the only purveyors of God’s message; special scientists were the Final Word when it came to The Science and health-based risk throughout COVID-19. Like high priests, their scientific claims could not be questioned. If we didn’t acquiesce to the technology, we were not only anti-science and anti-vax. We would be anti-health.
The ludicrous stupidity of vaccine passports for a rapidly mutating respiratory virus is patently clear for anyone with either awareness of the history of public health and epidemiology, or who is a primary care physician and understands the limits of vaccines – particularly for patients with complex chronic health conditions. Everyone is different. Everyone responds differently to both viruses and medication.
This media are not the arbiters of truth. They are tamed and compliant, and overly-dependent on opinion-based Op-eds while lacking resources, media freedom guidelines, and a public interest culture to ensure that they sniff out hypocrisy, contradiction and the missives of power.
It’s probable that the mountain of legislation produced over the last two years never fulfilled democratic norms of accountability and transparency. For science in a pandemic to be harnessed to serve the public interest, the institutions that set those terms of reference must be guided by principles that protect health.
