Dear Friends, poliomyelitis

I never thought I’d ever have to look up the correct spelling of that word. But here we are. I was a kid when the Salk vaccine was developed, and we all got vaccinated very quickly. But a boy in my primary school got polio, he didn’t die, but we all saw what happened to him; a friend of mine in high school had an arm that was a shriveled stick.

Do you know anyone who had polio? Anyone your age? It all depends on how old you are. Most of you, I think and hope, can say no. There is no reason whatever why that should ever change.

But reason doesn’t control the world. Rates of vaccination across the board are falling in the US, especially among children, and they are falling because of conscious efforts by anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists. Concurrently, cases of diseases that had more or less disappeared, notably measles, but at least one case of polio, have begun appearing again, especially among children. One of the most well-known of the conspiracy theorists is the president-elect’s candidate for head of the Department of Health and Human Services. At the moment we don’t know what his position on the polio vaccine is, but a close associate, whom he aims to make general counsel of the HHS, filed a suit demanding that the FDA revoke approval of the polio vaccine. Why? Because tests for it had not included a control group. He wants long term tests – over twenty years – on a group, now children, who will be divided between ones given the vaccine and ones given a placebo; and, of course, neither they nor their parents will know into which group they fall. Twenty years. And during those twenty years vaccination will be suspended, therefore, cases of polio will go from zero to … who knows, but the chances of contracting polio by a child given the placebo will greatly increase.

The candidate – all right, Kennedy – has not yet made a clear statement about the polio vaccine. However, we do know about actions of his that are relevant. Kennedy visited Samoa and spent his time their encouraging people not to get measles vaccinations, the rate of vaccination fell a lot. A year later, in 2019, a measles epidemic broke out during which at least eighty-three babies died. I recommend that you read or watch what Josh Green, a doctor and currently governor of Hawaii says about this. While Lieutenant Governor, he was made head of a team of seventy-five Hawaiian doctors and healthcare workers sent on an emergency medical mission to Samoa in response to the epidemic. Look up especially videos, it’s important to hear his voice as he speaks of this, and of Kennedy.

Green and his team met many of the parents of the dead babies, as they rushed from village to village to vaccinate as many as they could to prevent more deaths. As far as I know, Kennedy has not yet made a public statement about what he did in Samoa. If I were a member of the Senate I would ask him to go to Samoa (maybe the Senate could pay the airfare) to talk face to face with as many of the parents of the dead babies as possible and explain himself.

Kennedy has no medical or scientific expertise, qualification or experience whatever. Neither does his associate, Aaron Siri. They are conspiracy theorists, that’s all. Conspiracy theorists do not care about the truth, and they never admit to the consequences of their actions. The most utterly despicable of conspiracy theorists is Alex Jones; Kennedy and Siri belong with him: no whitewashing. (By the way, I just googled Infowars to make sure about the first name: the first thing that comes up is the official site still peddling lies, filth and misery. Isn’t it time to put this guy out of business if not behind bars?)

The estimate for unnecessary deaths from COVID-19 in the US is between 250,000 and 500,000 with the upper number more likely. Most of these deaths occurred because so many people believed the lies told to them by figures they trusted, beginning with Trump and his acolytes, and then many others including Kennedy and Siri. The point is not to assign particular deaths to particular individuals, rather, the concerted effort of all of them is the cause. Or: without this concerted effort most of those hundreds of thousands would be alive today.

Has any one of them ever in any way acknowledged complicity in all those deaths, deaths of those who trusted them?

Among all Trump’s nominations – nominations carefully designed as insults to the American people, but also as tests for Republican members of Congress, how low are you ready to sink? – this one is the most telling, the one that shows most clearly the indifference to life itself, provided that it is the life of others. Professional incompetence is the first level at which most of the nominees are properly disqualified (Pam Bondi is a partial exception, but that’s another story). But this incompetence is part and parcel of the ignorance and stupidity they share with Trump, and for which he nominated them.

If for one moment you start saying to yourself “maybe Kennedy has a point about health and diet” remember the babies of Samoa, remember the one and a half million lives saved by the polio vaccine.

Note: I was never a great fan of Robert F. Kennedy, I was warming up to him a bit, but I could never forget that he started out as Roy Cohn’s flunkey. Nonetheless, he was someone, and I will not refer to this other guy by those initials with a Jr. after them if I can possibly help it. Robert F. Kennedy is “numbered in the song”. That other one is not.

Love and solidarity,

Bobby