Abortion, Vaccines, and Autism

The title sounds like clickbait, but that is actually what this is about

Because some readers commented that Vinay’s post last Saturday was more politics than Sensible Medicine, I hesitate to even post this one. Although I won’t comment on the content of Vinay’s post, I do think his belonged here. The current politics have daily effects on us in medicine, especially those of us in academic medicine. This post originates from a different place, and I think it is apolitically political (or maybe politically apolitical), commenting on how the quality of public discourse on medical issues has, perhaps, reached its nadir.

Still, to avoid the risk of people worrying that we are getting too political, I am publishing this in addition to my usually Friday post — a little later in the day and paywalled. Please ignore if you don’t want something that is even politic-adjacent. I just had to get this off my chest.

Many of the important debates in the US have become absurdly simplistic. All nuance is abandoned as debate participants aim to rally their sides rather than prepare for a truce in everybody’s interest. The abortion debate probably reached this level of inanity first. The COVID Pandemic added vaccines to the list of topics that could only be discussed in public in black and white. Autism was added to the list last week. What all these debates have in common is that there are truths within each side’s arguments. These truth become rallying cries and are ignored by the other side. This type of engagement makes rational problem solving impossible.¹

Abortion