An article published in the journal Diabetes Care, a journal of the American Diabetes Association, and authored by credible scientists in the field, begins with this condemnation of the policies of the NIH administration:
Just a year ago, in these very pages, we highlighted the many threats the current U.S. administration posed to the health of our nation. Since then, there have been actions by the administration that have caused grave health consequences, and their current approach will continue to do so. The numerous measles outbreaks and associated avoidable deaths have resulted in part from hyping disproven theories of harm rather than publicizing the effectiveness of the measles vaccine. Plugging the concept that diabetes is curable by “changing the food source” simply ignores the large body of work that has demonstrated that it is not merely a disease of poor nutrition and the immense challenges of reinventing the food industry. Peddling conspiracy theories represents failures by officials of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), whose primary goal is to protect our health. These two examples represent just two of the broken promises made by the current HHS leadership during their confirmation hearings. And, despite promising oversight, representatives on Capitol Hill have shirked their responsibility and have allowed the country to continue along misguided paths that even they recognized as irresponsible.
It goes on at considerable length, documenting all the failures of Jay Bhattacharya and RFK jr. Read the whole thing.
The authors were at a meeting of the American Diabetes Association handing out copies of that editorial to attendees, when the society administration called in uniformed security to kick them out of the meeting, and cancelled their registration.
The incident took place Friday morning at a meeting of the American Diabetes Association in New Orleans, shortly before Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health, was scheduled to speak. An organizer announced just before Dr. Bhattacharya’s session that he would no longer be speaking; a senior adviser at the N.I.H. took his place.
The researchers were handing out copies of the editorial, recently published in the association’s flagship journal, which detailed the effects of N.I.H. cuts and other Trump administration actions on diabetes research and outcomes, when security staff asked them to step outside and tried to take away the papers, said Aaron Kelly, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota who was among the researchers escorted out. A video taken by MedPage Today, which first reported the news, shows a tense confrontation, including a man in uniform putting his hands on an expert.
Wow. That’s fascism in action, suppressing the free discussion of scientific assessment of the field. And this action was ordered by the officers of the American Diabetes Association!
Hours after he was removed, Dr. Kahn received an email from the American Diabetes Association stating that his behavior had violated the conference’s code of conduct.
“You were respectfully informed that distribution of materials was not permitted and given the opportunity to remain in the meeting if you stopped handing out the materials,” the email read. “When you continued the behavior, we had no choice but to remove you for the remainder of the meeting.”
The email went on to note that there are “a lot of logistics and security measures taken when a federal official is in attendance.” A spokesperson for the N.I.H. did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Several of the researchers said they believed they were removed partly because the association feared repercussions from the Trump administration.
The order refusing to allow the distribution of papers is pure bullshit. It is common practice for researchers to bring along copies of their relevant papers and hand them out. I’ve been at poster sessions where the author brings in a small stand and has a stack of papers that people can take away. Why would you limit the dissemination of information at a meeting whose purpose is to disseminate information?
That it was a “security measure” is equally disingenuous. What was the guy going to do, rush the stage with his papers and slash Bhattacharya with vicious paper cuts?
This action by the American Diabetes Association was simply cowardice by the organizers of the conference. They should be ashamed. This is going to go in the history books as another example among many of chickenshit institutions caving to their own oppression by the Trump administration.
Dr. Kahn said that the editorial aimed to advance science.
“It is no longer enough to stand idly by or work behind the scenes with lawmakers,” the experts wrote in their editorial. “Moreover, it is no longer appropriate to fret about political backlash. Now is the time to recognize and fight to reverse the spiraling fall of the United States of America’s status as the foremost nation in health care innovation.”
‘Hi honey, I’m home!’
‘Oh, how was the science conference?’
‘Wonderful!. We got rid of a bunch of science!’
Had to be pretty close to a conversation or 2 had that night, right?
I mean these are passionate, intelligent, hard working people who have devoted their lives to this stuff and are presumably the very top tier of doing what they do. I doubt there would be a 0.1% of people on the entire planet at these guys level in their field. I cannot fathom how you do and be that and simultaneously cave to pressure by those who would literally destroy it all if they could?
It is hard to know what justice for RFK looks like.
Aaaaall right, a comparatively small episode but I must agree: this is indeed pure unadulterated fascism.
It was exactly like this in Italy, with uni profs and students silenced and/or chucked out if they didn’t toe the line, their publications censored or destroyed.
Then came obligatory enrollment in the fascist party, again under pain of dismissal (and very few refused it must be said). Acts of resistance were rare, for instance Primo Levi was able to graduate because his professor didn’t care a flying fuck about the racial laws, but it was pretty unusual.
The organizers of the conference simply replicate the exact behaviour of 100 years ago, same cravenness, same Gleichschaltung. I also notice those rentacops not refusing to carry out those ridiculous orders, a lack of reflection typical of blackshirts.
Nice stinking kettle of fish really, I can see why many people don’t follow the news any more.
18 months ago one could legitimately argue that the US was the world leader in science. Now that is la tough argument to make. MAGA tyranny will be with us for a long time to come.
I was at a internal meeting at a research center and one of the top administrators said that it is not to bad. We can still do vaccine research. You just have to call it research on tropical disease and not use the word vaccine. I was in shock…
Sounds like a straightforward First Amendment violation, to me. It’s unlikely to be challenged as such, as you say, because of the craven cowardice of the responsible authorities, including Congress.
Rentacops were just doing what they are paid to do. They couldn’t care less about free speech rights.
The main thing is to get the papers out there rather than suppressed as RFK Jr seems to be doing with stuff he doesn’t like.
You can already see the disasters starting from the Trump regime’s War on Science and Medicine.
The parasitic screwworm is back in the USA again. It was eradicated from the USA in the 1960s.
This is a serious pest that infects all warm blooded animals.
It does not just infect cattle. Humans are also at risk. So are your dogs and cats. Wildlife populations such as deer can drop by 80%.
Shortly after Trump was elected, the USDA dropped the ball on containing the spread of the screwworm up from Central America.
and
It remains to be seen whether the Federal government can get it together enough to contain the first US outbreak of screwworm since the 1970s.
The organizers of that meeting need to be vigorously pitched out of their positions in the organization. And black-balled.
They can redeem themselves by turning in RFKJr’s head.
The Repugs & especially Trumpists War on Science will claim a LOT of needless human casualties and cause an incalculable, incomprehensible amount of destruction and harm that could have been so easily avoided if we’d had a Kamala Harris presidency instead.
Now the consequences of Trump’s war on Science and him being made effectively a dictator for life along with his successors will continue indefinitely and catastrophically far into the future.
The Trump regime is wrecking US science such that it would take decades to recover.
I doubt if it that will happen.
I was at a meeting a few weeks ago.
One climate scientist lost all her funding.
It wasn’t just her either, it was her whole large nationally known department.
They are scrambling to find funding for the graduate students and postdocs and probably won’t accept any graduate students for next year.
She is going part time and will probably just quit.
There was also a scientist from the EPA lab there. This is one of a few EPA centers in the USA.
Same thing happened. They’ve cut funding, moved people all over the USA, got rid of as many as they could, and wrecked the place as much as possible.
I’ve seen this movie before, a few times.
It can take years to build up a world class research institution and programs.
You can destroy it all in a few months by just cutting the funding and harassing all the scientists to the point where they quit.
So what else has Trump and RFK jr. accomplished to kill people so far.
.1. The ongoing measles outbreaks in the USA that have killed 3 children so far.
.2. The Ebola epidemic in Africa.
Containment efforts have been weak because, since the US abolished the USAID programs, we aren’t helping.
Fighting this new pathogen would benefit from an mRNA vaccine which the US could have rapidly provided in the old days before January 2025.
.
.3. Already mentioned the imminent screwworm outbreak.
.4. The next epidemic or pandemic.
There will be one.
We just don’t know where it will be and which pathogen it will be.