Kristian G. Andersen

Everyone should read points #1 and #2, these are crucial points to learn how to speak up in science in general, not just in these extraordinary times.

And the thing is it's a skill you've got to practice. You can't wait for the mythical most important or best positioned moment to speak your mind.

In their words - "because, not only did pandemic preparedness not prevent the last one, it caused it".

It's that level of ignorance.

I have never seen anything - I assume it was just decided so.

A line curve showing number of awards for fiscal year 2026 compared to fiscal years 2021-2025 across NSF. The fiscal year 2026 curve lies well below curves for other fiscal years.

NSF Update

Funding curve overall. A little bit of progress in the past week, but only a little bit.

Now by Directorate...

1/11

Yozwiak et al., Cell 2016 | Andersen Lab Roots, Not Parachutes: Research Collaborations Combat Outbreaks Cell 166(1):5-8 (2016) PDF

As well as another article - with a slightly different focus, but still highly relevant to the importance of science in pandemic preparedness - back in 2016.

andersen-lab.com/papers/yozwi...

Holmes et al., Nature 2018 | Andersen Lab Pandemics: Spend on Surveillance, Not Prediction Nature 558(7709):180-182 (2018) PDF

I agree that we shouldn't spend large budgets on "prediction", but that doesn't mean that we shouldn't spend to better prepare and, if we can, prevent future pandemics.

We wrote a whole article on this back in 2018.

andersen-lab.com/papers/holme...

Bhattacharya's comment that NIAID will "focus more on basic immunology and other infectious diseases [..], rather than on predicting future diseases" rests on a false dichotomy.

For one, NIAID spends little money on "predicting" things, which is not the same as trying to "prevent" and "prepare"...

This was back in June, 2025.

bsky.app/profile/kgan...

It's important to put this in context of one of the first things Taubenberger did when he took over as the director of NIAID - he canceled the premier pandemic preparedness network ("CREID" - which we were part of) because it was deemed "unsafe for Americans".

Cc. @maxkozlov.bsky.social.

Statement on the planned hepatitis B birth dose vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau WHO is aware of the proposed randomized controlled trial (RCT) on the hepatitis B birth dose vaccine in Guinea-Bissau. Based on questions raised in publicly available information and consultation with...

“Resource constraints cannot be used to justify withholding proven care in a research study involving people.”
@who.int with a much clearer and clearly argued statement than most of what I’ve seen on this.
🧪

www.who.int/news/item/13...

Next pandemic is gonna be lit 🔥
We’ll all be chugging protein drinks and swallowing deworming tablets and talking about “that which cannot be named” while our social media feeds tell us that anyone who died did not do enough push-ups…

But, Amy, we need to restore trust in science, dammit!

🙃

Exclusive: Key US infectious-diseases centre to drop pandemic preparation Staff members have been instructed to scrub this topic and ‘biodefense’ from the agency’s website.

After more than 1.2 Americans lost their lives to Covid, NIH director Jay Bhattacharya orders the agency to deprioritize pandemic preparedness & biodefense.

Make it make sense.

Scoop from @maxkozlov.bsky.social @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Sadly, that won’t solve the issue - once the damage is done, it’s done. It’ll take decades to rebuild - and by that time, we’ll be hopelessly behind as the rest of the world moves on.

Sadly, that won’t solve the issue - once the damage is done, it’s done. It’ll take decades to rebuild - and by that time, we’ll be hopelessly behind as the rest of the world moves on.

WHO director-general calls plans for U.S.-funded vaccine trial ‘unethical’ The director-general of the WHO said a U.S.-funded study of the hepatitis B vaccine in Guinea-Bissau would be “unethical” if it proceeds as planned.

As I reported Wednesday, @drtedros.who.int said it would be unethical to conduct a hepatitis B birth dose study in Guinea-Bissau. Today #WHO put out a statement outlining its objections to the proposed trial, partially funded by CDC. www.statnews.com/2026/02/11/h...
&
www.who.int/news/item/13...

Exclusive: Key US infectious-diseases centre to drop pandemic preparation Staff members have been instructed to scrub this topic and ‘biodefense’ from the agency’s website.

"[the US's] premier infectious-disease research institute have been instructed to remove the words “biodefense” and “pandemic preparedness” from the institute’s web pages".

As leadership said, all as part of the effort to "restore trust".

Down is up and up is down.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

An mRNA Refusal to File

"We are deliberately walking away from the most advanced form of one of the most effective public health measures available to the human race, and instead we are investigated older technologies that happen to involve the administration’s friends"

Indeed.

www.science.org/content/blog...

The first epsiode of the Science Counterpunch is now live!

Prof @peterhotezmdphd.bsky.social and Prof @michaelemann.bsky.social join us to discuss who is attacking science and why, what tactics you should watch out for, and how you can fight back!

YT Link: youtube.com/watch?v=O4PF...

🧪⚛️

An AI Agent Published a Hit Piece on Me Summary: An AI agent of unknown ownership autonomously wrote and published a personalized hit piece about me after I rejected its code, attempting to damage my reputation and shame me into acceptin…

AI agent goes nuts on open source maintainer after having its pull request denied. This is a pretty insane story. Open source development as we've been used to for the last few decades is likely over. 1/
theshamblog.com/an-ai-agent-...

Shingrix is a great vaccine with high effectiveness, however, there's always room for improvement and, importantly, it's always good to have multiple options, so I assume (but don't know) it's those two combined that made Moderna go down this path.

This is the key point - it's not about Moderna's flu vaccine, it's about sending a signal to the rest of the industry that vaccine development isn't viable in the US. It's all part of the larger anti-vaccine agenda.

You can't... repeal... a scientific finding. At that point it's just called lying about it.

Rare, dangerous side effects of some COVID-19 vaccines explained “Groundbreaking” study uncovers why adenovirus-based shots caused life-threatening blood clots and bleeding in some people

Ok, I know promised a thread on the fascinating and important new research explaining what happened with the rare, serious side effects of AstraZeneca's and Johnson&Johnson's Covid-19 vaccines.
So, @science.org story is here and 🧪🧵 is coming:
www.science.org/content/arti...

Announcing: Science Counterpunch Fighting back for science & scientists was never more urgent

Here is an announcement for everybody who is sick and tired on the attacks on science and scientists.

It has been months in the making, but now we are ready to fight back.

First episode airs tomorrow 5pm UK.

New episode every friday.

Incredible guests lined up.
open.substack.com/pub/protagon...

Squirrels could be a reservoir for the virus that causes mpox The species in which monkeypox virus naturally circulates is uncertain, but wildlife surveillance data suggest that the fire-footed rope squirrel is a likely candidate.

I really enjoyed working on this piece on Riutord-Fe et al, a fantastic piece of work that highlights both the power of comprehensive, longitudinal wildlife surveillance and the challenges of disentangling the roles different hosts play in pathogen maintenance ecology. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Scientists Figured Out the Problem With Johnson & Johnson’s COVID Vaccine Rare but dangerous blood clotting associated with that vaccine as well as AstraZeneca’s had a genetic cause, according to a new paper.

Fascinating stuff - the conundrum of why, in extremely rare cases, people ended up getting dangerous blood clotting after having received the adenovirus-based J&J (my first COVID-19 vaccine; Ad26-based) or AstraZeneca (ChAdOx1-based) vaccines has been solved.

WHO director-general calls plans for U.S.-funded vaccine trial ‘unethical’ The director-general of the WHO said a U.S.-funded study of the hepatitis B vaccine in Guinea-Bissau would be “unethical” if it proceeds as planned.

Director-General @drtedros.who.int minced no words today when asked about the proposal to run a trial of a hepatitis B vaccine birth dose in Guinea-Bissau. It would be "unethical to proceed with this study," he said. "Maybe it's better to say it bluntly & straight."
www.statnews.com/2026/02/11/h...

Prasad overruled FDA staff to reject Moderna's flu vaccine application The rejection is the latest instance of Vinay Prasad overruling career FDA scientists to place vaccines under harsher scrutiny.

This is outrageous, and (though it was completely obvious he should never have held this spot), Vinay Prasad needs to go. This vaccine candidate deserves review, not ideologically motivated rejection. Lives are at stake. www.statnews.com/2026/02/11/m...

They came to Massachusetts to cure disease. Now they’re packing up their labs. - The Boston Globe In a first-of-its-kind survey, the Globe asked hundreds of scientists about the impact of federal funding cuts.

Big @bostonglobe.com / MassINC Polling survey out this morning. "They came to Massachusetts to cure disease. Now they’re packing up their labs." We surveyed NIH funded scientists in Massachusetts about federal funding cuts & policies. Here's what they told us. www.bostonglobe.com/2026/02/09/m...