Dr. Michelle Fiscus, the top vaccination official in the Tennessee, was fired for encouraging teenagers to get vaccinated. She is a public health official who wants to save lives. Those who fired her thought she was alarmist, despite the deaths of 600,000 Americans who were infected with the coronavirus. Tennessee is a state with one of the lowest vaccination rates in the nation.
The now-former immunization director for the Tennessee Department of Health had been facing scrutiny from Republican state lawmakers over her department’s outreach efforts to promote COVID-19 vaccinations among teenagers.
“Now there is a fundamental lack of ability to discern credible information in the state of Tennessee amongst our leaders as well,” Fiscus told WKRN. “They don’t seem to be able to tell the difference between a Facebook meme and a peer-reviewed scientific journal publication.”
Dr. Fiscus told The Tennessean that she was fired Monday to appease lawmakers. She provided the newspaper with a copy of her termination letter, which does not explain the reasoning for her dismissal.
She also released a blistering statement accusing the “leaders” of the state of ignoring the dead and dying around them while turning their backs on doctors, scientists and other front line workers during the pandemic.
“I am ashamed of them,” she wrote. “I am afraid for my state. I am angry for the amazing people of the Tennessee Department of Health who have been mistreated by an uneducated public and leaders who have only their own interests in mind. And I am deeply saddened for the people of Tennessee, who will continue to become sick and die from this vaccine-preventable disease because they choose to listen to the nonsense spread by ignorant people.”
Dr. Fiscus told WKRN she was a scapegoat for a legislature bent on vaccine misinformation: “Our elected officials, many of them have really bought into this anti-vaccine propaganda that has been widely distributed, and they are not seeking the opinions of medical experts who understand these vaccines and understand this pandemic.”
August is National Immunization Awareness Month, but public health officials in Tennessee have been ordered not to acknowledge it.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Tennessee is obviously celebrating “National Immunization Against Reality Month”
LOL. Exactly.
We need to start bringing some politicians up on criminal charges.
The real problem is that they are brought up on criminality.
Yes
Totally agree, Jon. Decisions like this kill people. At a minimum, this is malfeasance, but it looks to me more like criminal negligence or even manslaughter.
Barbarians. Gov. Bill Lee is a favorite of the DeVos family and he shares their contempt for public education and all things public.
“Rep. Scott Cepicky, R-Culleoka, is one of the Republican lawmakers who has pressured the health department and he confirmed to Kelman he wants dissolution of the department to be considered. “
A nice chance for them to kill government. (Plus some kids, but they don’t care. )
We will soon refer to COVID as the Republican disease.
The R’sCOV2 virus
It also occurs to me that some Christian fundamentalists tend to believe it’s ok to kill their dependent women & children. The logical extension in TN’s GOP is to kill other people’s children.
Republicans have their heads in the sand. The pandemic is a far greater threat than they think. Their vaccination hesitation prolongs the pandemic. These “flat earthers” need a wake up call.
Republicans thought virologists said “fatten the Earth” when they said “flatten the curve”
Flatten the earth
prolongs the pandemic
yes, and so give opportunity for new, more deadly variants to arise, including, possibly, ones that will defeat current vaccines
These unvaccinated people endanger us all.
Or “Honor Our Great Leaders Who Protect Us From Truth Serum and Racism Month”.
I have been thinking a lot lately about the Grapes of Wrath and wondering if we are about to repeat this dark time in our nation’s history. We are seeing severe droughts in the west, the homeless population exploding, people living in tents, our food supplies having a difficult time meeting demands and inflation emerging as a concern for many.
At the same time, some states, particularly Red States, are labeling their own citizens as problems, restricting access to medical care (especially for women), ignoring scientific evidence that proves vaccines saves lives, and dividing citizens into separate classes while looking to strip away their right to vote in free and fair elections.
When Tennessee fires their top vaccination official for urging teens to get vaccinated, and other Right Wing leaders call for Dr. Fauci to be fired as well, I can’t help but think how people during the great depression were often left to fend for themselves. It makes me angry.
I remember of the children in The Grapes of Wrath scoured the dump for scraps of food while officials ignored their plight and sought to exploit their labor while the lack of medical care cost a mother the life of her child. The attempts of the down trodden to organize themselves were often met with violence by those in power and by those who were afraid of losing what they had.
Fast forward to today and their are many parallels to that dark time. Think about it, will we be facing our own wrath soon? Will we let the Far Right drag the soul of our nation down this path?
Spot on. And the lessons you learned from this great book–to my mind tied with Moby Dick for greatest American novel–will the next generation of high-school kids learn them? Or will the book not be jingoistic and nationalist enough for the Repugnican Know-Nothings to allow it to be taught?
There is a law on the books that mature minors can be vaccinated in TN without parent consent.
“Between 14 and 18, young people have the capacity to decide, according to the law, and the physician may treat without parental consent unless it is clear the child is not capable of making the decision.”
https://tennesseelookout.com/2021/06/16/piercey-to-face-raft-of-childhood-immunization-questions/
O my Tennessee! How often have I wished to shelter your people from these mountebank leaders, who would lead you into an abyss. But they are everywhere, and no one will confront their myopia.
I think it has gone way beyond myopia — to myopiates.
These people are taking something that is fundamentally affecting their ability to think.
So, how bad does it have to get, Roy? How many Tennesseans have to die? How many have to watch their children die?
It must be horrific for you, watching this, Roy. Safety to you and yours!
There is a law on the books that mature minors can be vaccinated in TN without parent consent:
https://tennesseelookout.com/2021/06/16/piercey-to-face-raft-of-childhood-immunization-questions/
“Between 14 and 18, young people have the capacity to decide, according to the law, and the physician may treat without parental consent unless it is clear the child is not capable of making the decision.”
Sorry for triple posting…the site would not let me post it at first. Diane, you can delete this one and the one above.
Macron got tired of dealing with the risky low vaccination rates at about 44% in France. He just mandated required vaccinations to shop and get on a train or plane. The US may have to bite the bullet if the Delta variant continues to spread. In South America there is another very contagious variant called Lambda that is already spreading, and it is even more powerful. Governments may have to impose the vaccine in the interest of public health.https://thehill.com/policy/international/562764-1-million-people-in-france-make-vaccine-appointments-after-macron
I would favor a presidential order that all people within our borders, citizens and noncitizens alike, be vaccinated or imprisoned.
It would be one thing if these people’s imbecility affected only them. Fine. Darwin Award. But people who decide not to get vaccinated make of themselves a clear and present danger to everyone else.
I remember the terror about polio in the 1950s. Everyone was terrified of catching and spending their life in an “iron lung.” When a vaccine appeared, there were no anti-vaxxers.
When a vaccine appeared, there were no anti-vaxxers.
Wow. Of course, there was no Trump telling people that the disease was a hoax.
My memory of the polio vaccine is how the whole community went over to the local high school and ate the sugar cube. I was disappointed, since I had already been vaccinated at the drs office.
My other memory of that era was the army coming to the school to explain how aggressive North Vietnam wanted to take the rice from passive South Vietnam making US intervention necessary.
Either way, school was the lynchpin of our community.
How many people have to die while the US caters to the anti-science right wing?
Republicans seem to have a death wish by refusing the vaccine
Great question, rt!!!
Tennessee Stands and one Elizabeth Murphy are behind this particular firing. https://tennesseestands.org/about/
http://elizabethforknoxville.com/
Murphy is calling the firing a big win for them. TN STANDS seems all about “the Govt is oppressing you” & religious dominionism.
Not good that these kooks have so much influence. Their website reveals a strong drive for grassroots organizing. Bad news all round.
Gosh, I sure hope that anti-vaxxer Elizabeth Murphy doesn’t get the virus!
You nailed it, Diane. You absolutely nailed it. Its Libertarianism gone freaking mad.
I hope she finds a lawyer to take the state to court for wrongful termination and that she ends up a multi-millionaire even after her lawyer takes out his/her share when the court cases reach their conclusion.
hear, hear!
My husband’s daughter ( living in the Dallas area) is an educated person but she and her husband ( both with a MBA) made a decision that they will not get vaccinated and two of their children will not be vaccinated ( 3rd one is too young to have vaccine). However, when my husband was/is visiting the area close to her, she insisted on meeting my husband. Horrible.
I question the use of the word “educated” when one’s education has not included the scientific method, medical science, health, and history. Now if you specify “…is educated in business administration,” that makes sense.
Sorry you are going through this, May!
Darwin Awards all around for Republican Anti-vaxxers!
https://news.yahoo.com/24-year-old-who-needed-double-lung-transplant-wishes-hed-been-vaccinated-for-covid-19-180810400.html
https://journalstar.com/lifestyles/health-med-fit/health/nebraska-farmer-who-got-covid-19-wishes-he-had-gotten-vaccine/article_1cb658d5-da39-5da2-a5b4-0175b681baad.html
https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-941fcf43d9731c76c16e7354f5d5e187
This map shows where the latest outbreaks of Covid are. The data correlate to Republican led counties. They did not even receive data from TX, GA and VA. Most of coastal Florida has been vaccinated except for the Panhandle. My county has a 32% vaccination rate.https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/13/covid-cases-rise-in-us-counties-with-low-vaccination-rates-as-delta-variant-spreads.html
32 percent!!!!!!!! Yikes
Be safe, retired teacher!
Most of the older folks are still wearing masks in public and following safety protocols. The younger people believe they are safe. Some of them will learn the hard way.
It has become increasingly clear that you can still contract COVID19 (particularly from the Delta variant) even if you are vaccinated.
The vaccines still tend to reduce the severity of the illness, but don’t insure that you won’t get it AND don’t ensure you won’t pass it on to someone else, perhaps who is unvaccinated.
So it makes good sense to continue to wear a mask indoors in public.
As far as I can see, the CDC made a mistake in saying that people who have been vaccinated don’t need to wear a mask or physically distance indoors.
This is particularly true, given that the pandemic is still raging in certain places AND the vaccines have a lower effectiveness against the variants than against the original strain.
This would seem to be common sense.
And to just assume as the CDC did that the people who are not fully vaccinated are going to keep following the CDC guideline to wear a mask is just foolish.
Much better to keep the mask wearing recommendation in place for everyone , which would have little down side, at any rate and could have a significant impact on the long term persistence of the virus.
But what do I know? I’m not a virologist of epidemiologist or any other kind of busy (not even a biologist or geologist)
Any kind of “gist”
Not any kind of busy
By the way, I think COVID recommendations coming from a team of geologists would probably make more sense than some of the CDC recommendations we have seen over the past year.
I suspect the geologists would not just take things like continued mask wearing by the unvaccinated for granite the way the CDC has.
::rim shot::
SDP— many in my area of NJ take Murphy’s relaxation of protocol literally – lots fewer masked customers in stores (tho staff all masked). My ‘relaxation’: at the grocery store I am OK with cloth instead of N95 now, and at my small farm store with huge front & back open double-garage-doors plus giant fan, I have finally unmasked [er, as of yesterday…] Definitely still distancing (as are most customers).
RE: breakthrough cases. There seem to be few reliable nationwide stats; not all states are keeping a good count. But I trust MA, & found these stats, measured through 7/9/21: 4,278,111 fully vaccinated [that’s 63%]. 4,450 confirmed breakthrough cases. Among the breakthroughs they have so far 79 deaths and 303 hospitalizations. So, breakthrough cases are running 0.1%. For breakthrough cases, 7% hospitalized and prox 2% died.
As to whether breakthroughs are due to D-variant being more potent, I don’t think we know that. Here in US, D is the prevalent strain now anyway; also I don’t see a rise in % of breakthro’ cases; the rate is similar to before D. I tried to research this 2 wks ago when I first heard vaccination was less powerful against D, but the only solid stats I got were from India (showing efficacy 60-70%)– but the vaccines everyone got in India are different from the Pfizer/ Moderna type, all 3 of them are from weakened/ inactivated virus. Also one of the three (Sputnik V) only had 80% efficacy to begin with…
Taking COVID for Granite
It’s written in stone:
“Leave masking alone”
With vax in the arm
There’s really no harm
In ditching the thing
And having a fling
The Alphas and Deltas
Will really not melt us
So have a cigar
And jump in the car
It’s Crimson and clover
Pandemic is over
Some testing, eg, in Israel has shown that the pfizer vaccine is only about 64% effective against both preventing infection with the Delta variant and at preventing symptomatic COVID. Some other studies have shown a higher effective: between 80 -90%.
But one doesn’t need to know the “true” effectiveness to know whether it is a good idea to keep the mask recommendation in place, just that the chance of contracting the variant virus and getting the disease is still significant even when one is vaccinated.
I think it’s easy to miss the forest for the trees in this case.
Incidentally, here’s the rationale I see the UNvaccinated adopting with regard to the CDC’s mask recommendation when they are indoors in a public place.
“Everyone who is not wearing a mask has been vaccinated, so I won’t get the virus from them. And the only people I might get the virus from are unvaccinated folks, but they are wearing masks (according to CDC), so I won’t get the virus from them. Therefore, I don’t need to wear a mask indoors in public”
It may sound goofy but a goofy CDC policy breeds a goofy rationale.
I think you are overthink the rationale for not getting vaccinated. It’s a political statement. No one’s going to tell me what to do. You can’t make me. It’s libertarianism gone mad.
The CDC has made one obscenely bad call after another throughout the pandemic. This nonsense about vaccinated people not masking up or maintaining distance is simply the most recent example. The organization has become completely politicized. It now does science by asking whatever politician is in charge what he wants to hear.
This is shameful and extremely dangerous.
Duane
I think you misunderstand.
I was not talking about a rationale for not getting vaccinated.
Purely about a rationale for not wearing a mask, given that one is not vaccinated.
And it’s certainly not a rationale I would subscribe to.
Just a guess at how I think someone who is not vaccinated might rationalize not wearing a mask indoors in a public place, given the current (goofy) CDC stance on masks.
Speaking of Darwin…
Can you imagine these legislators being around when his THEORY of evolution was being taught. Why, they’d have fired teachers and everything.
Oh, wait… they did that.
Well, these GOP fools are bringing trouble to their house and it will take time, but they too will “inherit the wind!”
Oh yes.
Look, if you have not been vaccinated yet, you are putting not only yourself in danger but everyone else. We are in the middle of a dramatic spike in Covid-19 hospitalizations, deaths, and physical issues from Long Covid, all highly correlated to the percentage of vaccination in particular areas. Here’s the other thing: if you don’t get vaccinated, you are contributing to making Covid an active, persistent problem and to an environment in which it can mutate into ever more deadly forms. Lots of kids getting the Delta variant now. Thanks to people like you. And this coming school year? It will be a disaster.
You are putting everyone’s lives at risk.
Not just the unvaccinated.
The people who are vaccinated but have stopped wearing a mask indoors in public or even social distancing are also making things worse and prolonging the pandemic since the vaccines do not fully prevent contraction of the virus, dont fully prevent passing it to someone else or even fully prevent getting sick with COVID19 (although they do reduce the severity)
The response to the pandemic is just an ongoing train wreck.
The COVID Express
The train is off the tracks
And skidding in the ditch
Response is led by hacks
Who known’t which is which
Just had a huge argument with my brother about this. I mentioned, in passing, that I still mask up and try to maintain distance when I am out and about, and he went off on my and started quoting the obscenely politicized CDC at me. So, even in my own family, this idiocy.
From someone in MY family, i have heard wearing a mask if you are vaccinated described as “unscientific”.
I find that hilarious because science is NEVER about certainty.
So it’s actually unscientific to effectively claim that you know for certain that a mask won’t make any difference because that assumes you are certain that the chance of getting the virus if you are vaccinated is precisely zero — something science does not allow you to be.
I have witnessed more ignorant statements masquerading as science over the past year than I have seen or heard in the rest of my years combined.
Ignorance seems to be on the rise.
But I have given up arguing about this stuff with people who don’t know anything about science because it goes nowhere fast.
Exactly, SomeDAM
Wearing mask (an easy thing to do): chance that you will AVOID catching Covid-19 and
a) experiencing the often terrible symptoms of this disease;
b) being hospitalized;
c) dying;
d) surviving and suffering the often horrific effects of Long Covid,; and/or
e) infecting others
Not wearing maski: chance that you will catch Covid-19 and
a) experience the often terrible symptoms of this disease;
b) be hospitalized;
c) die;
d) survive and suffer the often horrific effects of Long Covid,; and/or
e) infect others
You can choose to try to beat a red light when the light has turned yellow, and if you do, and someone is harmed as a result, it’s one you. Same with not wearing a mask. So, this decision is negligence and callous.
Throughout the pandemic, one truth that has been clearly revealed, as the Trump administration revealed the extent of racism in this country, is how prone to wishful, magical thinking many Americans are. First they wished that they didn’t have to wear masks and the CDC lied to them and told them that only medical professionals needed to; then they wished that it only affected adults and wanted to send kids back to school at the height of the pandemic, and the CDC told them, hey, that’s just groovy because you can magically distance enough in confined classrooms to avoid these PERSISTENT AIRBORNE DISEASE VECTORS; and then there were all the imbeciles who took medical advice from King Imbecile himself; now there are the people who are again listening to the CDC when it tells them that running around maskless is hunky dory. Wishful, magical, unscientific thinking. And a CDC that doesn’t offer scientific advice but, rather, serves as yet another propaganda arm of the regime. And don’t get me started on the American Academy of Pediatrics. In both the CDC and the AAP, scientists who chose magical thinking based on political pressure and/or rationalization of their desire for reality to be what it so obviously wasn’t.
Did anyone else notice that the highly politicized propaganda organization, formerly a scientific organization, the Centers for Disease Control, the moment Trump lost the election, got real about Covid-19 and kids FOR ABOUT A DAY before bowing to political pressure again and pretending that their catching the disease and spreading the disease wasn’t an issue?
And now, when Biden was calling for people to get back to normal and schools to open, business as usual, the CDC issues its idiotic and dangerous guidance on masks and so encourages people like these idiotic Repugnican governors.
This is horrific. It’s totalitarian government stuff. The CDC’s JOB is to tell us the unpleasant TRUTH. And they haven’t been doing this for a long time.
Maybe they should rename the CDC the “Centers for Disinformation Control”
Or maybe Centers for Displease Control, since it seems to fashion it’s role as controlling the public and President’s displeasure.
The Centers For Displease Control
The Centers for Displease Control
Are working hard to spot us
To minimize the psychic toll
On public and the POTUS
With no engineer.
cx: everyone’s life
The problem is that people like the Republican politicians and officials undermining the vaccine rollout don’t have to deal with its’ consequences the same way regular folks do.
Like Trump and some other Republicans, they are more likely to be given monoclonal antibody treatments — especially the Regeneron version — for patients with mild to moderate symptoms before they get worse.
I would like the Biden administration to do a serious investigation as to who is getting those early monoclonal antibody treatments and if they tend to be largely privileged Americans. Those treatments are for non-hospitalized Americans and are given in the early stages of the disease when it is still mild. How many less privileged Americans who have the same or even more serious risk factors are given that as soon as COVID-19 is suspected? How many very privileged Americans are?
How many low-income folks who contract COVID will be told by the doctor to stay home until the symptoms are serious?
The outcomes are unlikely to be shared equally by those with prominent voices telling Americans they don’t have to get vaccinated – and their families – and those who listen to them or contract COVID despite taking precautions because too many Americans listened to them.
The media has failed here. Do we even know how many Republican legislators have been vaccinated or if their families have been? Was Tucker Carlson vaccinated? He won’t say. Neither will most of the anti-vaxxers.
No one shoujld be allowed on any news show spewing anti-vax rhetoric until they reveal their own and their family’s vaccine status. If the NYT or any media organiation quotes Tucker Carlson without beginning any story where he is mentioned by saying “Tuckler Carlson, who refuses to tell Americans whether he or his family is vaccinated, is now ……
It doesn’t matter if the storyt is about vaccinations or anything else. Every Republican politician like Senator Ted Cruz, should only be identified by their vaccine status and anytime they are publicly interviewed the first question should be “why won’t you tell your constituents whether you and your family got the vaccine when your party is so against the vaccine and scaring Americans into not getting it?
All good points, & I especially agree that media should pressure those promoting anti-vax notions to reveal vax status. Not just media pundits but especially state actors like those in this article who are making it difficult for their own state public health dept to publicize the necessity for vaccination!
Gov DeWine of Ohio just signed a law banning schools and universities from requiring their students to be vaccinated. At the same time, the state is offering cash prizes Ina lottery for those who get vaccinated. Crazy.
And sadly, Governor DeWine is one of more rational right wing Republicans. At least he doesn’t seem to be trying to encourage the conspiracy theorists, although he has certainly further enabled them by banning schools from requiring vaccines.
Kids will get Covid and die because of DeWine’s idiotic decision, and others will contract Covid and give it to parents or grandparents or other adults who will get sick and die.
The time will come when we should hold these people accountable for their malfeasance.
This is edifying, because one so seldom has a chance to see real genius at work.
I was at a meeting tonight talking with parents of children who have battled addiction to drugs. Meanwhile the news came out today that the CDC confirms what we knew has been blowing up during the pandemic: “U.S. Drug-Overdose Deaths Soared Nearly 30% in 2020, Driven by Synthetic Opioids”
What the hell is going on in this country??
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-drug-overdose-deaths-soared-nearly-30-in-2020-11626271200
All I can say is that the comments on this particular entry are a much welcome respite. I was taking a break just now reading through them….
Whatever GRIM news comes our way, you are the best. Smart, funny, thoughtful…..That’s a great thing to come home to.
P.S. not sure the link above will be walled off….this story has been elsewhere today.
Yes,I heard on every news station that drug overdoses soared this past year. I assume that it was pandemic-related: isolation, depression, lack of social interaction, life on hold. Meanwhile, the Sackler family benefits from a recent settlement that allows them to keep their billions from the opioid trade.
Id guess that the prosecutors in the case figured that it was better to get some immediate relief for those families who have been affected by opiate addiction and death than to have the law suits drag on for years with no guarantee that people would get anything in the end.
I can’t say that that was not the best strategy.
What they really needed to do in this case was charge individual members of the Sackler family with felonies for their role in purposefully covering up the dangers that they clearly knew existed and misrepresenting the safety (or, more precisely lack thereof) of Oxycontin, specifically with regard to addictiveness.
There was a segment on NPR, I think it was All Things Considered two days ago. The Attorney General of Connecticut (where the Sackler’s “business” is located) explained he would NOT support the settlement because it does not go far enough in holding the crime family (my words) accountable.
I’m glad to hear that, Mark. The Sackler family is said by Forbes to be worth $14 billion. The settlement does not touch their wealth. Meanwhile drug deaths are at an all-time high.
They have already moved at least $1 billion into Swiss bank accounts.
Probably much more.
The Swiss don’t seem to care where their deposits come from. They have a long history of acting as bankers for criminals and even Nazis.
Re “crime family”
CTs Attorney General Tong actually called the Sacklers ” thugs” in response to a threat leveled against the states bringing the lawsuits.
” If these entitled thugs think they can ride off on their yachts clinging to their art and jewelry, they have another think coming”
The TN GOP cleverly framed their objections to Fiscus’ e-mail in 2 ways- one, she represents the bad govmt’ usurping parental control. And, they blamed her for “failing” to quell the high numbers of TN’s COVID outbreaks.
Shaming Republicans is ineffective. The more we shame them the more gleeful & vengeful they are.
Opps. I forgot to post this in the comment https://apple.news/ADD154nrjRdWQz39LDdH-aw
https://apple.news/ADD154nrjRdWQz39LDdH-aw
from the article:
Fiscus’ firing was followed on Tuesday by a bombshell report from The Tennessean that the health department will cease all vaccine-related outreach to minors—not just for COVID-19, but for other diseases like the flu and HPV. The paper also reported that the health department will stop hosting COVID-19 vaccine events at schools and even stop sending postcards reminding teenagers who’ve been partially vaccinated to get their second dose.
Tennessee officially renounces any concern for the health of its residents.
This stuff really matters because, before we open schools again, especially in these red states with lots of unvaccinated people, we need to make sure that the teens and adults in those schools are vaccinated–ALL OF THEM–and that they all have access to and are wearing N95 or equivalent masks. Otherwise, more horror and heartbreak, a prolonged pandemic, and increased possibility of the emergence of variants that will defeat our vaccines.
I had been hoping that the Biden administration would stop coddling the antivassers, who endanger us all. NO SUCH LUCK.
cx: antivaxxers
Well, TN was the state that brought the “Scopes Monkey Trial.” I sometimes feel we are going to relive it. Between the anti-vaxxers and the fear of Critical Race Theory, we may have gone back farther in the hole than we were 100 years ago.