The Deadly Rise of Anti-science

A professor of pediatrics and molecular virology at Baylor and a courageously outspoken advocate for public health, Hotez documents how agitators on the extreme right have graduated from trying to sow mistrust in science to targeting individual scientists such as himself. The heart of his book is a call for government agencies and professional organizations to wage an aggressive battle against anti-vaccination and anti-science propaganda.

[Dr. Hotez is] better known as a 2022 Nobel Peace Prize nominee for helping to develop two COVID-19 vaccines that were administered more than 100 million times in India and Indonesia. Last year, he wrote a new book, The Deadly Rise of Anti-science: A Scientist's Warning. For his pains, he has been villainized by the antivaccine community online and labeled by antivaxxer presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the OG, or Original Gangster.

Hotez paints a bleak picture of public science denial during the pandemic, embedded in historic context....[He] makes the case that the denial of scientific knowledge is not isolated, random, or benign. Rather, it is an organized and dangerous movement. Along with offering context for anti-science movements, he humanizes the scientists working to help us.

Hotez is well-positioned to raise alarms about anti-science. He is a physician scientist who, for both personal and professional reasons, was publicly defending vaccines long before COVID-19...The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science foretells a worrisome future for vaccines in America.

Dr. Peter Hotez sheds light on the pervasive anti-vaccine lobby that has gained significant traction....Reversing the damage caused by anti-vaccine movements requires addressing the underlying psychological and political factors that fuel this skepticism.

We need an infrastructure to assist scientists in their desperately needed ancillary role as science communicators. Peter Hotez...offers direction to achieving these new goals. We hope that scientific institutions will take heed and follow.

Hotez, who has extensive experience with coronaviruses, describes anti-science efforts regarding vaccinations in general, vaccination of children, and COVID-19 vaccinations in particular. It is time for scientists and the public to resist these attacks....Recommended.

In this era when truth, evidence and science are, to put it bluntly, under attack, it is important that we share lessons and provide support in our health services and policy research community....[Dr. Hotez] advocates for organized supports from scientific organizations and associations to equip and protect scientists who are working to defend science.

Because government health agencies have been ineffective in opposing hateHotez argues that more is needed to protect biomedical scientists.

Chronicles much of the anti-vaccination movement, the promotion of misinformation, and the role of politics in the spread of anti-science, all the while detailing the deliberate attacks and aggressions on scientists. Though it establishes anti-science's historical roots in authoritarianism, the focus of this book is on the politics and climate of the current state of science.

A short, frightening analysis of the rise of anti-science sentiment in the United States and throughout the world....Hotez is particularly well-suited to provide such analysis and warning.

Globally, anti-science is a key part of the far-right, autocratic, populist playbook. Hotez's terrifying but profoundly important book shows how deep the anti-science rabbit hole goes, who is thriving on chaos, and why anti-science is surging everywhere. The book is an eye-opening exposé of the catastrophic consequences of anti-science.

Dr. Hotez is the pioneer of a new breed: physician-scientist-warrior. He led the efforts in the United States against mis- and dis-information during the COVID pandemic and, long before that, took on the anti-science and anti-vax movements. His story, remarkable work, and insights are aptly portrayed in The Deadly Rise of Anti-science.

Peter Hotez, a physician scientist fighting the war on infectious diseases, describes the impact of the anti-science movement. The victims are those who fall prey to its rhetoric and suffer the consequences. This is a must-read for anyone interested in the state of scientific affairs and public health.

Vaccines are a critical public health tool in preventing life-threatening illness and death. Their use and lifesaving impact are now seriously threatened by the deadly rise of anti-science. Hotez provides a front-row seat to the unfolding infectious disease catastrophe we are facing. He delivers a clarion call to action like no one else can.