I sat down with Jay Walker for a two-part @tedmedcommunity.bsky.social conversation about scientific integrity, medical ethics, and a controversial hepatitis B study that raises bigger questions about trust and accountability.
Watch Part 1 now on the TEDMED website:
tedmed.com/conversation...
Casey Means has a history of putting profits over people.
The American people deserve leaders committed to safe, evidence-based recommendations -- not lining their own pockets.
Yet another example of how deeply unqualified she is to be Surgeon General.
Thanks to @katherineeban.bsky.social with @rollingstone.com for a great piece about Casey Means' grifting of unsafe products.
archive.ph/G21Xy
EXCLUSIVE: As Dr. Casey Means awaits Senate HELP committee vote for Surgeon General, my latest @rollingstone.com investigation finds 5 of her newsletter sponsors stood accused of selling products w hazardous ingredients, unsafe lead levels or PFOA traces: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
The publisher Elsevier confirms it has turned down a request from the leaders of the Bandim Health Project to retract a commentary in Vaccine that analyzed their work on non-specific effects of vaccines & concluded there were significant problems with it. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
That controversial vaccine study? Yep, dodgy from go.👇
www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol... by @katherineeban.bsky.social
"...inadequate human research protections" & not vetted by scientists at CDC.
@jakescottmd.bsky.social: “...funding an unsolicited study to generate doubt about a vaccine..."
In today's episode of "As the #CDC Turns", the agency's #2 official — the one who actually goes to work in Atlanta — steps down from a job he started in early January. "Unforeseen family obligations cited as the reason for Ralph Abraham's departure. www.statnews.com/2026/02/23/r...
Pretty amazing that comms person at FBI called my @ms.now colleague @kendilanian-nbc.bsky.social a liar and demand a correction only for Kash to post a photo from the locker room
The US President, which does not offer free healthcare to his own people, wants his own people to offer free healthcare… to Greenland… which already has free healthcare.
Maybe it is time for another brain scan for the US president.
A grant request proposed a trial to study whether a birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine had negative effects.
7 current + former CDC employees say that everything about the proposal set off alarm bells: "None of our scientists would touch this...”
Story: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
Just read a striking investigation into a proposed CDC-funded hepatitis B vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau. It details an unusually fast, politically driven grant process and serious questions about ethics oversight and protections for newborns in a high–hepatitis B setting.
New reporting says that Kennedy-aligned political appointees at the CDC fast-tracked a $1.6m grant for a randomized trial in Guinea-Bissau that would delay the hepatitis B birth dose for half of ~14,000 infants, bypassing the agency’s normal scientific/competitive review...
TAT: [Attacking Science]
If the registration for the Institutional Review Board (IRB or ethics board) in Guinea-Bissau expired in 2018, as this article in Rolling Stone says, then all previous studies published with data from the research program there must be scrutinized.
This a great piece of investigative journalism. @rollingstone.com
This should be required reading for scientists and ethicists.
Ethics matter, especially in science.
www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
A lot of people, including me, were wondering how an IRB could ever approve this study.
The answer is that no IRB did. The person who “signed off” on approval from the only ethics board that reviewed it had resigned three years earlier. His signature was used without his knowledge.
Story includes quotes/expert input/hyperlinks from
@jakescottmd.bsky.social Dr. Arthur Caplan @hollylynchez.bsky.social Seema Shah @drdebhoury.bsky.social @weekendavisen.dk @jeremyfaust.bsky.social @energycommerce.bsky.social /7
Ole Skøtt, U. of Southern Denmark's health sciences dean, tells @rollingstone.com: “Your enquiry contains new information in relation to the validity of the ethical approval. I have decided this should be investigated. The Hepatitis B project has been put on hold to assess the new information." /6
The Guinea-Bissau ethics committee was required to have an active registration w/ HHS Office of Human Research Protections. But its registration had expired in 2018 and is listed as deactivated in the OHRP database. /5
The study only underwent 1 ethics review, in Guinea Bissau. The ethics committee's Nov. '25 approval letter bears the name of the president Cunhate Na Bangna. He tells @rollingstone.com he left committee 3 years ago + his name was used on letter w/out his knowledge or permission. /4
The trial planned to study potential harm from hep B vax birth dose. The proposal was not vetted by, or homed within, a CDC scientific center. Instead, it was routed straight from director’s office to grant management officials who approved it in 10 days. /3
The proposed trial, by a Danish research duo admired by RFK Jr., came w/ intense pressure for approval from CDC director's office, say 7 current + former CDC employees. “None of our scientists would touch this with a 10-foot pole,” a CDC employee says. /2
EXCLUSIVE: In my latest @rollingstone.com investigation, new documents/20+ sources reveal a controversial vaccine study's unusual path to CDC approval, and irregularities in the only ethics review done, in Guinea-Bissau: rollingstone.com/politics/pol... /1 🧵👇
I hope John Roberts signed all his mortgage paperwork correctly
Superb reporting from @katherineeban.bsky.social for @rollingstone.com on the scandal around the RFK-fueled, unethical HBV vaccine study in Guinea Bissau that horrified CDC staff, scientists and ethicists around the world. www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
New from @katherineeban.bsky.social in @rollingstone.com: CDC appointees bypassed the agency’s scientists to rush-fund a study questioning the hep B birth dose. The ethics committee president says his name was used on the approval without his knowledge.
www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
I could keep posting quotes. This is just so beyond anything I’ve seen in modern global health research. It is criminal. But, instead, I recommend just getting a Rolling Stone subscription because their health reporting, especially @katherineeban.bsky.social has been excellent.
The Senator Who Has Made It Her Mission to Stop RFK Jr.
@alsobrooks.senate.gov on Kennedy's first year as health secretary: “His leadership has been absolutely disastrous.”
Interview: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
