Just Asking Questions

Why Did Harvard Fire Martin Kulldorff?


Listen Later

At least 40 U.S. colleges still require a COVID vaccine, according to nocollegemandates.com, an initiative that tracks and opposes the mandates.

Martin Kulldorff, a professor of medicine and biostatistician who lost his job at Harvard for refusing the vaccine even though he'd already survived a COVID infection, says such mandates are "unscientific" and "unethical." Harvard has since dropped the mandate, but Kulldorff likely won't be getting his job there back anytime soon because the Harvard-affiliated hospital that employs medical school faculty still requires a COVID vaccine.   

Kulldorff, who created one of the earliest disease outbreak surveillance software systems, was also booted from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) COVID-19 vaccine safety commission and regularly de-boosted on Twitter and YouTube for his views. Former National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins labeled him and his co-authors of the Great Barrington Declaration "fringe epidemiologists" and demanded a "quick and devastating…takedown" of their call to end lockdowns in favor of a "focused protection" strategy. 

Kulldorff joined Reason's Zach Weissmueller and Liz Wolfe on the latest episode of Just Asking Questions to talk about his ordeal at Harvard, his retrospective on the pandemic and the cultural and governmental response to it, and his involvement in the ongoing Supreme Court case Murthy v. Missouri, in which plaintiffs argue that federal agencies violated the First Amendment by pressuring social media companies to take down certain content about COVID-19. 

Watch the full conversation on Reason's YouTube channel or on the Just Asking Questions podcast feed on Apple, Spotify, or your preferred podcatcher.

Sources referenced in this conversation:

  1. NoCollegeMandates.com's Google Sheet list of U.S. colleges with and without vaccine mandates 
  2. COVID-19 Vaccine Safety Group at the CDC
  3. Flagged Kulldorff tweet 
  4. Our World in Data: vaccinated vs. unvaccinated U.S. COVID deaths
  5. "Sweden during the pandemic," by Johan Norberg
  6. "Serious adverse events of special interest following mRNA COVID-19 vaccination in randomized trials in adults"
  7. Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo's recommendation on COVID vaccines
  8. The Food and Drug Administration and CDC's response to Lapado's recommendation
  9. "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False," by John P. A. Ioannidis
  10. Timestamps:

    0:00 - Forty colleges still require COVID vaccines

    2:17 - What happened between Martin Kulldorff and Harvard
    5:57 - How vaccine mandates are unscientific and unethical
    7:54 - Why is there a push to vaccinate children?
    11:30 - Being a dissident at Harvard
    14:00 - Fired by the CDC for being too pro-vaccine
    19:25 - Vaccines are good for some while bad for others.
    21:33 - Being censored online for speaking the truth
    25:54 - How masks were ineffective during COVID
    28:29 - There has been no reckoning for what happened during COVID.
    30:31 - No one should be allowed to violate the First Amendment.
    36:21 - How Sweden handled COVID
    42:19 - How a good health system kept COVID deaths down
    44:25 - What is jawboning?
    47:20 - What is the best public health use of the mRNA vaccines?
    50:22 - How COVID vaccine data is unreliable
    55:32 - What should the COVID policy recommendations be now?
    59:16 - Is the peer-review process flawed?
    1:03:24 - Will politicians ever be held accountable for their COVID policies?

    The post Why Did Harvard Fire Martin Kulldorff? appeared first on Reason.com.

    ...more
    View all episodesView all episodes
    Download on the App Store

    Just Asking QuestionsBy Reason

    • 3.9
    • 3.9
    • 3.9
    • 3.9
    • 3.9

    3.9

    96 ratings


    More shows like Just Asking Questions

    View all
    Cato Podcast by Cato Institute

    Cato Podcast

    966 Listeners

    The Glenn Show by Glenn Loury

    The Glenn Show

    2,262 Listeners

    The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table by Comedy Cellar Network

    The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table

    22 Listeners

    The Fifth Column by Kmele Foster, Michael Moynihan, and Matt Welch

    The Fifth Column

    2,832 Listeners

    The Reason Roundtable by The Reason Roundtable

    The Reason Roundtable

    1,505 Listeners

    The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg by The Dispatch

    The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg

    6,536 Listeners

    The Political Orphanage by Andrew Heaton

    The Political Orphanage

    970 Listeners

    Quillette Podcast by Quillette

    Quillette Podcast

    790 Listeners

    The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie by The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie

    The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie

    721 Listeners

    The Soho Forum Debates by The Soho Forum Debates

    The Soho Forum Debates

    197 Listeners

    Blocked and Reported by Katie Herzog and Jesse Singal

    Blocked and Reported

    3,770 Listeners

    The Unspeakable Podcast by Meghan Daum

    The Unspeakable Podcast

    790 Listeners

    Honestly with Bari Weiss by The Free Press

    Honestly with Bari Weiss

    8,618 Listeners

    The Reason Rundown With Peter Suderman by The Reason Rundown With Peter Suderman

    The Reason Rundown With Peter Suderman

    59 Listeners

    Why We Can't Have Nice Things by Why We Can't Have Nice Things

    Why We Can't Have Nice Things

    130 Listeners

    The Best of Reason Magazine by The Best of Reason Magazine

    The Best of Reason Magazine

    16 Listeners

    Conversations With Coleman by The Free Press

    Conversations With Coleman

    426 Listeners

    Breaking History by The Free Press

    Breaking History

    675 Listeners