On Friday 8th August, a gunman opened fire on the offices of the Centers forDisease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, but it barely seemed to make a ripple in the news. The British media seemed to ignore it. Why disregard this horrendous attack?
Bullets hit the buildings and shattered windows, causing CDC employees to hide fortheir safety as over 500 rounds were fired at their workplace. In this hail of gunfire only one person died, that is still one person too many. David Rose, 33, was a police officer, who graduated from the police academy in March, later died in hospital from his wounds.
All so unsurprisingly, this was the work of a lone gunman. He was Patrick Joseph White, 30, who had tried to get into the CDC’s headquarters but was turned away. He then went to the building across the road, from where he opened fire on the CDC Headquarters. He was found dead there.
This sorry story is all too sad but all too familiar from America, the lone gunman, with some sort of grudge, takes his guns and decides to seek “revenge” on an organization, his ex-employer or even just complete strangers. But why did this man choose the CDC?
The CDC is America’s national public health organization. They monitor infectious diseases in the country, especially new and emerging ones, track outbreaks of infectious diseases, including managing vaccination programs. They are not a secretive or shadow agency, they are a public health organization, who are very open about what they do. The question is still, why attack them?
The shooter believed he had been harmed by the Covid vaccination, causing him to be depressed and suicidal, none of which are recognised side effects. There have been so many conspiracy theories about the Covid vaccination flying around the internet and social media, many of them are so outlandish as to be almost laughable. But was this shooting just a logical progression of these conspiracy theories? Previously, the FBI warned that prominent conspiracy theories, including the right-wing QAnon hoaxes, are fuelling domestic extremists to carry out acts of terror. Is this the first anti-vax conspiracy to fuel an act of terror?
Robert Kennedy Jr, American Secretary of Health, said he was "deeply saddened" by the attack. "We know how shaken our public health colleagues feel today. No-one should face violence while working to protect thehealth of others," he said. But is he innocent of all blame? He has been fanning the fires of anti-vax conspiracy theories for years.
He has previously said vaccinations cause autism, which is just untrue. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has examined extensive research and studies,over many years, and found no link between the MMR vaccination and autism.
Kennedy has also cast baseless doubts on the effectiveness of vaccinations, especially the Covid vaccinations, and misrepresented their side-effects. He has been accused of spreading misinformation about vaccines.
He has been a long time denier of vaccinations’ effectiveness. Over twenty years ago, he jumped onto the conspiracy theory about thimerosal in vaccines. Thiomersalis an organomercurial derivative of ethylmercury, meaning it is a substance made from another substance that is a mercury salt. But saying it is dangerous because its a derivative from a mercury salt is like saying table salt is dangerous because it’s a sodium salt. Plus, all the “evidence” used to claim thimerosal was “dangerous” was obtained from studies into mercurypoisoning in food. But Kennedy doesn’t seem to let facts get in his way when he jumps onto another anti-vax conspiracy.
Kennedy is now in charge of America’s health policies.
At the beginning of August, Kennedy’s health department halted $500m in mRNA vaccine research, ending 22 federal contracts. Most vaccines contain a weakened or dead bacteria or virus but mRNA vaccines contain small pieces ofmRNA, usually a small piece of a protein found on the virus’s outer surface,this triggers the body’s normal immune response, which recognises that the protein is foreign and produces antibodies against it. mRNA vaccines are generally safer because they use the body’s immune system to fight pathogens, the mRNA Covid vaccines were very effective (between 94% and 95% effective), though no safety concerns were identified from them, and researchers believe this technology will have many further uses and benefits.
Peter Hotez, a pediatrician who directs the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children’s Hospital, said about mRNA vaccines, “for a pandemic situation with anew and previously unknown pathogen, or for cancer vaccines and immunotherapeuticit [mRNA technology] has distinct advantages.” Dr Jerome Adams, who served as the US surgeon general during Donald Trump’s first presidency, said the mRNA vaccines technology helped end the Covid-19 pandemic and saved more than 2million lives “by the most conservative estimates”. But Kennedy said, while justifying his ending of mRNA research funding, “(They) fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu”. This is untrue because there is no evidence to back this claim.
Kennedy’s vaccine denial is now manifesting in government policy, cutting funding for mRNA research because it “fails”. This sends out a wider message to other vaccine deniers that they are right too. It can also empower people like the CDC shooter, reinforcing their extreme views. Nothing happens in a vacuum, in any society.
The American Federation of Government Employees, the CDC workers’ union, said the violent shooting didn’t happen in a vacuum but “compounds months of mistreatment, neglect, and vilification that CDC staff have endured”. They said vaccine misinformation had put scientists at risk.
But why did the British media ignore this shooting?
Many British right wing newspapers and media outlets have supported anti-vaccine conspiracy theories, reporting them as almost facts and drawing links that aren’t supported by the evidence. They gleefully jumped onto Andrew Wakefield’s discredited and fraudulent study that tried to discredit the MMR vaccine, but were slow to report on the deception behind it when it was exposed. Even the BBC, supposedly the last bastion of “balanced” reporting, still refers to vaccinations as “jabs”, a derogative term first used by the anti-vaccination movement. Is it any wonder they ignored this shooting?
And what did Donal Trump do in response to this shooting?
He has sent the National Guard into Washington DC to “police” it’s streets becausehe claims there’s a crime wave sweeping the city, even though data from the police department showed that homicides dropped by 32% between 2023 and 2024, reaching their lowest level since 2019. It shows were his priorities are, and they aren’t with stopping dangerous conspiracy theories.
Drew
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