Category: Public Health

The Healthcare Costs of Fossil Fuels

While the debate continues about the true impact of burning fossil fuels on the climate and what the optimal policy response should be, we need to make sure we do not neglect another aspect of fossil fuel use – air pollution and the effect it has on our health. There is a growing body of research showing a significant negative impact with...

/ July 23, 2025
A magical scene with several white unicorns in a vibrant, colorful landscape featuring waterfalls, flowers, a sparkling river, distant mountains, and a grand castle under a glowing sky with birds flying overhead.

The Opinion Class: Practicing Focused Protection From Reality

A class of sheltered COVID pundits are eager to conjure an alternate history where we let the virus spread in 2020 and everything turned out just fine.

/ July 13, 2025
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tucker Carlson

After ACIP: Where Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will likely go from here in his quest to eliminate vaccines

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was on The Tucker Carlson Show last week. It got me to thinking: What's next in RFK Jr.'s crusade against vaccines after he turned ACIP into an antivax committee?

/ July 7, 2025
A person wearing a blue long-sleeve shirt checks a white smartwatch on their wrist, displaying a colorful screen with time and fitness activity data.

Wearables and Wellness Populism: How Smart Watches Got MAHA’d

Fifteen years ago, then-contributor Peter Lipson wrote a short post on this blog that I’ve reflected on many times since. Titled Your Disease, Your Fault, Peter described a central theme that runs through nearly every variant of alternative medicine: That illness is preventable, and therefore, your fault. According to this worldview, disease isn’t a product of biology, inequity, or chance. It is...

/ July 3, 2025
Clown Car

RFK Jr.’s reconstituted vaccine committee meets for the first time, and I can’t help but think of clowns…antivax clowns

Last week, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s reconstituted Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices (ACIP) met for the first time. The proceedings reminded me, more than anything else, of an antivax clown car.

/ June 30, 2025
Several gold bars are stacked, but one bar is cut open to reveal a gray, rough interior, indicating that it is not solid gold.
So it begins

RFK Jr.’s remade ACIP meets: And so it begins (in earnest)…the dismantling of US federal vaccine infrastructure

The newly reconstituted CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will meet this week. Packed with antivaxxers, the antivax-adjacent, and the unqualified, ACIP will begin the dismantling of the US federal vaccine infrastructure.

/ June 23, 2025
Antivax America

Anti-Vax America

In which Dr. Gorski engages in a little shameless self-promotion for what he believes to be a good cause.

/ June 22, 2025
Two men in white shirts and patterned ties sit side by side against a plain black background, looking toward the camera.

The Long Med Con: The Self-Styled Expertise and Expansive Invoices of Mark & David Geier

All it takes is a coming-of-age consultancy and you, too, can morph from an average teenage Joe or Josephine to an instant "vaccine expert"

/ June 12, 2025
Two hands are raised above the surface of a body of water, suggesting a person is struggling or in distress, possibly drowning, with a clear blue sky and calm water in the background.