Curious Bioethics: June 12-June 18, 2023
Olympian Tori Bowie died from childbirth, Anti-vaxxers harass experts, and Harvard's stolen human remains scandal
In today’s curated collection, you’ll find:
Bioethics in the News: Olympian Tori Bowie died from childbirth, Anti-vaxxers harass Dr. Peter Hotez
Recommended Reading: Stonewall Riots, Preventing the Next Pandemic
Educational Opportunities: Black Mamas Matter Alliance webinar, How the Media Created Anti-Vax Monsters
Hey there, Curious Human!
I looked at Twitter this morning and quickly discerned that its billionaire-conspiracy-theory-loving owner and popular anti-vaxxer Joe Rogan (and others) are attacking renowned vaccine scientist & physician Dr. Peter Hotez. Did you know he literally helped invent and distribute a patent-free Covid vaccine to improve global access? In the last 24 hours, Hotez has been stalked by anti-vaxxers.
It was so disappointing, I considered throwing my phone but didn’t want to wake my sleeping partner… So I shut the app down and decided to do some baking before anyone else woke up. Hooray for using mature coping skills…
Today is Father’s Day, bringing up a range of emotions because we humans come from complex, sometimes deeply damaged families of origin. While some people have loving, largely positive relationships with their fathers, others experience abuse, abandonment, and worse at the hands of their sperm donors. If like me, you’ve had to erect some sturdy boundaries between you and your dad, I get it. For those whose fathers have died, today may be uniquely challenging no matter where you are on the dad relationship spectrum. It’s all valid.
I am in the fortunate position of loving the father of our children, and while my family doesn’t do big to-dos over this holiday, I used it as an excuse and baked some apricot & oat scones.
Bioethics in the News
Olympian Tori Bowie Dies at 32 From Childbirth Complications
While Tori Bowie died suddenly last month, her autopsy was released this week, showing she died in bed while 8 months pregnant and in labor.
I touched on America’s abysmal Black maternal mortality previously. Check out those graphs again if you need a reminder about how stark the landscape remains for Black women in the country. This harkens to Serena Williams’ near-death birth experience when she almost died from a pulmonary embolism. Williams’ story of an outrageous amount of deeply informed self-advocacy, shows how poorly we listen to Black women seeking health care.
Additionally, Bowie’s death highlights the anti-pregnancy discrimination many women in sports continue to face. Allyson Felix, Bowie's former teammate on the U.S. relay team, trained in secret before dawn to hide her own pregnancy. She called for major changes in how women athletes are treated.
Harvard Human Remains Trafficking Scandal
Just out of curiosity, would you know anyone in the market for a fully in tact, embalmed brain?"
~ Facebook quote from two people involved in the morgue scandal
Five people have been charged in a modern body-snatching scheme that may involve up to 400 cadavers from Harvard’s morgue. A former morgue manager at the Harvard Medical School, Cedric Lodge, has been charged with selling human remains from donated bodies between 2018 and 2022. One of the people he sold the body parts to included Katrina Maclean for her store Kat’s Creepy Creations (which was raided in March). The shop’s owner said her products would "shock the mind and shake the soul." A post on her Instagram account (now disabled) stated "If you're in the market for human bones hit me up." Sales of bones, skin, faces, and brains totaled tens of thousands of dollars. Lodge’s wife, and two other individuals, were also charged.
I’m never surprised at what people will sell, but I also foolishly believed today’s morgues had better protections to prevent body-snatching schemes.
I used to give a lecture to undergrads on the history of human remains trafficking, from grave robbing for anatomical study and colonial remains stealing for museums, up to the recent phenomenon of plastinated human remains on display at Body Worlds. I talk about morgues, mores on human remains for study, and anthropology’s necessary work returning remains from raided cultures. I talk about consent for donating one’s body for scientific study, as well as the consent controversy around Body Worlds (with scant/shady evidence of consent) and Real Bodies (accused of using the remains of Chinese political prisoners).
The Harvard morgue case shows the market for human remains is not limited to a historical problem, and not limited to plastination shows.
(On a side note regarding media reporting and using images to drive clicks, you’ll see the same photo of a man with a half-face tattoo and numerous piercings used as clickbait in many reports about this case. This is Jeremy Pauley - one of the five people indicted on federal charges in the Harvard scandal. Notably, while this case has been evolving for months, I didn’t read about it until Harvard was implicated and the feds got involved. Candace Chapman Scott, a former Arkansas mortuary worker, was charged in early April 2023 after being accused of selling 20 boxes of stolen body parts to Pauley. She has no face tattoos, so I guess less clickable…)
Vaccine Expert Dr. Peter Hotez stalked in Houston
Unfortunately, spreading accurate vaccine information these days means you get harassed. Despite being about as expert as one can be on vaccine science, Dr. Hotez experiences a great deal of harassment. Yesterday, things ramped up considerably when anti-vaxxers with highly influential social media accounts targeted him related to prominent anti-vax evangelist and 2024 presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
You can read the timeline at Forbes, which summarizes the events on Twitter and in Houston (where Hotez practices).
I learned about anti-vaxxer harassment the hard way in 2019 when I proudly published my first op-ed in a real-life newspaper, Teens with Anti-Vax Parents Should Have Right to be Vaccinated. I was so proud of my teen health message, but the email and direct mail harassment started immediately. The university assigned me a risk assessor, I had to start parking my car in a new place every day, and take my name off my office door for several weeks. My experience was so minor compared to what people like Hotez tolerate regularly.
It was… eye-opening. And that was before the pandemic provided the substrate to amplify the most fringe anti-vax voices.
My colleague’s brand new paper, Physician and Biomedical Scientist Harassment on Social Media During the COVID-19 Pandemic, shows the ripples of social media harassment:
Social media plays a role in disseminating medical and scientific knowledge to the public; however, high levels of reported harassment may lead more physicians and scientists to limit the way they use social media, thus leaving propagation of misinformation unchecked by those most qualified to combat it.
Dr. Hotez, and other prominent vaccine scientists, are doing incredibly brave, dangerous work by publicly spreading vaccine science. We need to do more to prevent misinformation and disinformation before the next vaccine-preventable outbreak.
Recommended Reading
During Pride Month, you may have noticed I have recommended a bunch of LGBTQIA lit. This week, I’m also including one of Dr. Hotez’ books in light of increasing anti-vax shenanigans.
The Stonewall Riots
Coming Out on the Streets
“Think of all the people involved in the Stonewall Riots and the gay liberation movement… All of them used their voices, and organized, and agitated, and fought for what was right. That’s what makes social change possible.”
~The Stonewall Riots: Coming Out on the Streets
The 1969 Stonewall Riots were a pivotal moment in America’s discrimination against LGBTQIA folks. This easy to read book has wonderful graphics, photographs, and prose to help readers understand the history and legacy of the LGBTQ+ movement, leading up to Stonewall and what followed. Great book for your pre-teen readers and up!
Preventing the Next Pandemic
Vaccine Diplomacy in a Time of Anti-Science
“Globally, vaccine diplomacy highlights science innovation as an international treasure. It represents one of our most noble pursuits - science for the benefit of humankind - and a vision for hope and a better world.”
~ Peter Hotez
In his most recent book, Dr. Hotez highlights how modern diseases are spurred by global war and conflict, climate change, poverty, and the rising threat of anti-science messaging. He brings a unique perspective from his time as the US Science Envoy for the Middle East and North Africa. Hotez shares the human cost of vaccine preventable illness on a global scale - critical reading for anyone whose view has mainly been limited to US-centric vaccine issues.
Educational Opportunities
No registration, just straight to YouTube for on-demand bioethics education.
BMMA: Black Maternal Health & Abortion Care Virtual Panel
The Black Mamas Matter Alliance (BMMA) hosted a virtual panel discussion around narrative change, messaging, and illuminating the connection between Black Maternal Health and abortion care. Moderated by BMMA's Executive Director Angela D. Aina, panelists across different sectors participated in an impactful conversation held Wednesday, June 8, 2022
Anti-Vaxxers
How the Media Created a Monster
Apologies - this one has an ad in the beginning. Skip to 1:43 to get to the nitty-gritty. The folks at Wisecrack do a great job explaining how bothsidism and sensationalism are used to manipulate our discussions around vaccination and anti-science rhetoric.
That’s it!
As always, thanks for being curious!
Hit reply and let me know what ethics issues you are most curious about this week—I’d love to hear from you!
See you next week!
Be Well & Be Curious,
Alyssa
