Carl Bergstrom, a theoretical and evolutionary biologist, believes the magazine is part of an ongoing attempt to bring about doubts about established scientific consensus. “If you can create the illusion that there is no dominance of opinion that says vaccines and masks are effective ways to control the pandemic, you can undermine the idea of scientific consensus, you can create uncertainty, and you can ‘ A specific pressure raises agenda ahead, ”he says. According to peer-reviewed articles, he can cover politicians who want to make certain decisions, and this can also be used in court.
When Kulldorff was reached by telephone on Thursday, Kulldorff said Bhattacharya and Makary were approached to be on the editors before their nominations by President Trump. “At the moment they are not active members of the board,” he said. (The magazine website contains Bhattacharya and Makary as “on leave.”) He added that there is “no connection” between the magazine and the Trump administration.
Kulldorff told Wired that the magazine would be a place for an open discourse and academic freedom. “I think it is important for scientists to publish what they think is important science, and then it should be open to discussion, instead of preventing people from publishing,” says Kulldorff.
Kulldorff and Andrew Neymer, an epidemiologist at UC Irvine who was a proponent of the lab leak theory of Covid’s origin, is named the main editors of the Journal. Scott Atlas, tapped by Trump to serve in the White House Coronavirus Task Force in 2020, is also named an editorial board member. Atlas, a radiologist through training, has made false allegations that masks do not work to prevent the spread of Coronavirus.
In January, Neymer wrote an OP-ED support Bhattacharya’s nomination for NIH administrator. In it, he praised Bhattacharya for his openness in different points of view. The OP-ed was published in RealclearPolitics.
Angela Rasmussen, an American virologist and research scientist at the University of Saskatchewan, says she is concerned that the magazine could be used to draw up and legitimize pseudoscientist and anti-public health views. “I don’t think it’s going to give them credit to real scientists. But the public may not know the difference between the Journal of the Academy of Public Health and the New England Journal of Medicine, ”she says.
Taylor Dotson, a professor at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology who studies the intersection of science and politics, says there is a ‘legitimate concern’ that the magazine can become a repository for evidence that the arguments provided by people in the administration is elected. If confirmed, Bhattacharya and Makary’s boss may be Robert F. Kennedy jr. Be, Trump’s nominee to guide the Department of Health and Human Services, which is known for promoting a wide range of scientific beliefs, including that there is a link between vaccines and autism and that AIDS is not by the HIV virus not caused.
Dotson warns that the risk of the existence of magazines that is now in line with a certain political view can deepen the politicization of science. “The worst case is that you start the magazines for the people who are a kind of populist and anti-establishment and the magazines for the people who also read NPR and the New York Times.”