Peter Hotez is a professor, COVID-19 vaccine researcher, and author who works at Baylor University in Houston, Texas.
Hotez became the focal point of controversy in June 2023 when podcaster Joe Rogan offered him $100,000 to debate Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a prominent anti-vaccine activist, on Rogan’s podcast. When confronted at his house on video, Hotez said he hasn’t decided yet whether to debate Kennedy.
Twitter CEO Elon Musk chimed in, writing, “Maybe @PeterHotez just hates charity 🤷♂️” Musk also tweeted, “He’s afraid of a public debate, because he knows he’s wrong.” However, others have urged Hotez not to debate Kennedy as debate rages over the question on Twitter.
Tom Nichols, a staff writer at The Atlantic, tweeted, “No medical professional should ever agree to do this. Never. It elevates the conspiracy guy, demeans the medical professional, and will only convince the kooks out there that RFK is right because a real doctor took the time to debate him. Never debate a conspiracy theorist.”
Rogan responded to Nichols, writing, “That would be a great suggestion if you could assure that the industry you were representing wasn’t completely captured by heartless monsters who have a history of some of the biggest criminal fines in human history because their deception has cost hundreds of thousands of people their lives. It would be a great suggestion if the industry you were defending didn’t occasionally look at human beings as an opportunity to generate insane wealth regardless of the tragic consequences. But you can’t do that, so… maybe it would be a good idea to have a f****** debate.”
In December 2022, Hotez wrote on Twitter, “Almost 100 million doses of our patent-free @TexasChildrens @BCM_TropMed Covid vaccine technology has been administered in low- middle-income countries. Now we’re making a BA.5/bivalent Covid vaccine for the world.” He has also frequently appeared on television to discuss COVID-19 vaccines and is the author of an upcoming book critical of the anti-vax movement.
“A pediatrician and an expert in vaccinology and tropical disease, Hotez has authored hundreds of peer-reviewed articles and editorials as well dozens of textbook chapters,” his Amazon.com biography says. He wrote on Twitter that “200,000 unvaccinated Americans needlessly perished because they fell victim to antivaccine activism.”
Hotez has more than 363,000 followers on Twitter.
Here’s what you need to know:
1. Joe Rogan Tweeted That He Challenged Peter Hotez to a Debate Because He ‘Publicly Quote Tweeted’ a Vice Article Accusing Rogan & Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of Spreading ‘Misinformation’ on Vaccines
Rogan tweeted at Hotez, “Peter, if you claim what RFKjr is saying is ‘misinformation’ I am offering you $100,000.00 to the charity of your choice if you’re willing to debate him on my show with no time limit.”
He was responding to a tweet by Hotez, which read, “Spotify Has Stopped Even Sort of Trying to Stem Joe Rogan’s Vaccine Misinformation. It’s really true @annamerlan just awful. And from all the online attacks I’m receiving after this absurd podcast, it’s clear many actually believe this nonsense.”
Hotez had tweeted a Vice article reading, “Spotify Has Stopped Even Sort of Trying to Stem Joe Rogan’s Vaccine Misinformation.”
The Vice article in question accused Rogan and Kennedy of spreading misinformation when Kennedy appeared on Rogan’s podcast, writing, “A broad swath of the anti-vaccine universe celebrated Thursday, when Joe Rogan, the biggest podcaster in the country, hosted a three-hour conversation with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the anti-vax luminary turned presidential candidate. The conversation was an orgy of unchecked vaccine misinformation, some conspiracy-mongering about 5G technology and wifi, and, of course, Rogan once again praising ivermectin, an ineffective faux COVID treatment.”
Talking leadership with @JoeRogan. A good leader brings forth people’s better natures. I am running for President to do exactly that. #Kennedy24
Rogan has tweeted at Hotez directly, writing, “Again, I’m going to ask you very clearly, are you willing to debate @RobertKennedyJr on my podcast?”
Hotez responded, “Joe if you are serious about addressing vaccines + the fact that 200,000 unvaccinated Americans needlessly perished during our awful delta/BA.1 Covid waves (including 40,000 in our state of Texas) because they fell victims to vaccine disinformation: I want to have that discussion.”
To be clear: the best @PeterHotez, the biggest Covid jab advocate around, can say for the mRNAs is that if he had made every American get them – at incalculable Constitutional cost – Covid deaths would be ~15% lower now.
Not 50%. 15.
That’s HIS estimate.
Rogan responded, “This is a non answer. I challenged you publicly because you publicly quote tweeted and agreed with that dogsh** vice article. If you’re really serious about what you stand for, you now have a massive opportunity for a debate that will reach the largest audience a discussion like this has ever had. If you think someone else is better qualified, suggest that person.”
Hotez responded, “Joe, you have my cell, my email, I’m always willing to speak with you.”
I had a great time with @JoeRogan in Austin this week. The episode is now live. Listen + share and consider making a donation to t.co/gWqnMhHPmw if you resonate with our conversation.
Hotez responded to Musk’s tweet about charity, writing, “Elon: Maybe you weren’t aware but in 2020 we asked you to support our lab that ultimately made low-cost, patent-free Covid vaccines, 100 million doses administered. Even though you couldn’t help us then, we still need help for our low-cost XBB booster + universal CoV versions.”
Rogan also accused Hotez of deleting a tweet about the controversy:
By the way, @PeterHotez , I saw this tweet that you deleted.
The pot of money has grown for Hotez to agree to the debate.
Steve Kirsch then tweeted, “I just upped the @joerogan debate offer to $600K for Hotez to debate RFK Jr.” According to MIT Technology Review, Kirsch helped fund COVID research but has since criticized COVID vaccines as “toxic.”
Rogan retweeted a video by independent video creator Matt Orfalea that calls Hotez “The Great Double-Talking Vaccine Scientist.”
The Great Double-Talking Vaccine Scientist
It contains news clips of Hotez describing the “unique potential safety problem of coronavirus vaccines” but then later saying, “get vaccinated now.” Other clips show him saying, “vaccinate your children. I’m strongly recommending for adolescents to get their two doses of vaccine,” before saying, “We’re seeing that two doses is not holding up well for emergency room visits.”
2. Peter Hotez Is the Dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor University in Houston, Texas
Peter Jay Hotez, M.D., Ph.D, is listed as the “Dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine” at Baylor University in Houston, Texas, on the university’s website.
According to the website, he is also a professor in the Departments of Pediatrics and Molecular Virology & Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine, is an “endowed chair in Tropical Pediatrics” at Texas Children’s Hospital, and is co-director of the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development.
He is listed as “founding editor-in-chief” of “PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases” and is a fellow in Disease and Poverty for the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University in Houston, the website says.
He is also a “health policy scholar” in the Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy at Baylor and a faculty-senior fellow at Hagler Institute for Advanced Study & Scowcroft Institute of International Affairs at Texas A&M University.
Hotez has a medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College in New York from 1987 and gained a Ph.D from The Rockefeller University in New York in 1986. He received bachelor’s degree from Yale University in 1980, the Baylor website says.
3. Peter Hotez Is Involved in Developing ‘Coronavirus’ & Other Vaccines That Have Been Administered to More Than 100 Million People
Baylor UniversityPeter Hotez.
Hotez’s university biography says that he has developed coronavirus vaccines that were “administered to over 100 million people in India and Indonesia.”
He is currently researching “a multivalent pan-coronavirus vaccine to protect against multiple coronavirus variants.”
In addition, the website says that Hotez is helping develop a vaccine “for the more than 400 million people suffering from hookworm infection in the world today. Vaccine currently in phase 1 clinical trials in Brazil and Gabon.”
He is also working on a “Schistosomiasis vaccine,” which is a disease the page says kills an estimated 280,000 people each year. “Our vaccine is entering phase 1 clinical trials,” the page says.
Hotez is also involved in a project to develop new vaccines to combat Chagas disease and leishmaniasis.
In addition, he is working on a “new vaccine to prevent severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). A prototype RBD219 N1 vaccine is entering scale-up process development” and is working on a “panhelmintic vaccine to prevent ascariasis (roundworm) and trichuris (whipworm), soil-transmitted helminths afflicting hundreds of millions of people around the world,” the website says.
4. Peter Hotez Tweeted That He Was ‘Stalked’ in Front of His Home
I confronted @PeterHotez and asked why he is too scared to debate @RobertKennedyJr on the @joerogan podcast!
On Twitter, Hotez wrote, “Ugh I just was stalked in front of my home by a couple of antivaxers taunting me to debate RFKJr. Of course I was looking my Sunday best in our brutal heat wave. What is it with people? Well at least Houstonian’s now know I support the team…#GoTexans.”
In the video posted by Alex Rosen on Twitter, Hotez said he hadn’t decided whether or not to debate Kennedy. “I haven’t said anything one way or the other,” he said, adding, “He just invited me, so we’ll see.”
Ugh I just was stalked in front of my home by a couple of antivaxers taunting me to debate RFKJr. Of course I was looking my Sunday best in our brutal heat wave. What is it with people? Well at least Houstonian’s now know I support the team…#GoTexans
He walked away when asked by Rosen whether he thought vaccine injuries “were real.”
Frank Han, MD., tweeted, “I stand against all stripes of harrassment of professional scientists. Just a PSA, if you are wondering why, we don’t debate antivaxxers (reason number #123948).”
Richard Hanania, who runs the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology, tweeted, “If putting all speech on an equal footing leads to people taking RFK, Jr seriously as an intellectual or politician, it’s the strongest case for internet censorship I’ve ever seen.”
Errol Louis, a podcaster and columnist, tweeted, “Depressing to see serious issues reduced to entertainment for conspiracy cranks and the idle rich. @PeterHotez, a serious and respected scientist, should not participate in this bad-faith b******* under any circumstances.”
However, Michael Schermer, a magazine publisher, tweeted, “Dear @PeterHotez I encourage you to debate @RobertKennedyJr on @joerogan on vaccines, autism, Covid, cell phones & cancer & all the rest. I did a 3.5 hour debate on Joe’s show—he’s a stand-up guy & will absolutely be fair & give you the time you need. Podcasts are the new media center. Why would you pass up $100,000 & tens of millions of viewers? Do it.”
5. Peter Hotez Is an Author Who Claims an Anti-Vaccine Movement Caused Thousands of American Deaths
1/2 As both vaccine scientist + parent of a daughter with autism, I wrote Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel’s Autism, which gave me a front row seat to 20 years of antivaccine activism, watching it grow into a political enterprise. My new book out soon
Hotez is the author of an upcoming book called, “The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science: A Scientist’s Warning.” On Amazon, the book is described as discussing “how an antivaccine movement became a dangerous political campaign promoted by elected officials and amplified by news media, causing thousands of American deaths.”
The Amazon caption for his book reads, in part:
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, one renowned scientist, in his famous bowtie, appeared daily on major news networks such as MSNBC, NPR, the BBC, and others. Dr. Peter J. Hotez often went without sleep, working around the clock to develop a nonprofit COVID-19 vaccine and to keep the public informed. During that time, he was one of the most trusted voices on the pandemic and was even nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for his selfless work. He also became one of the main targets of anti-science rhetoric that gained traction through conservative news media.
On Twitter, he explained, “As both vaccine scientist + parent of a daughter with autism, I wrote Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel’s Autism, which gave me a front row seat to 20 years of antivaccine activism, watching it grow into a political enterprise. My new book out soon.”
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