Melanie Matheu, PhD
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lilscience.bsky.social
Melanie Matheu, PhD
@lilscience.bsky.social
7.8K followers 340 following 56 posts
Scientist, Founder (2x), and Immunology expert. Excited about advances that blend tech, bio, and engineering. Don't fight biology, leverage it. No medical advice. Substack: https://substack.com/@lilscience
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Reposted by Melanie Matheu, PhD
USAID’s website has been deleted, all that is left is a note saying all personnel are now on administrative leave and personnel outside the US are to be brought home. Completely illegal, no act of congress or even executive order was signed to dismantle the agency
What happens when scientists are censored? People die.

New Substack post on the status of censorship of United States Scientists "February 1st Has Come and Gone, US Science Remains Censored"
February 1st Has Come and Gone, US Science Remains Censored
Remember what happened last time we tried to ignore Scientists? The problems don't disappear, they kill Americans.
lilscience.substack.com
The results will only be as good as the quality of the data. Given that we don't seem to believe in fact checking anymore I'm not sure this will be a useful tool for anyone doing serious research. Data quality matters.
Infectious Disease Roundup: 2/2/2025.

Probable human case of H5N1 in Delaware. Egg prices high forever? More deadly, highly contageous Clade Ib MPOX continues to spread (14% pediatric patients in recent outbreak), and more fun topics.
Infectious Disease Roundup: 2/2/2025
Second Largest US Egg producer hit with H5N1, Probable Human H5N1 case in Delaware, Clade Ib MPOX spreading in DRC and a new case in the UK, Polio Detected in wastewater of several EU countries...
open.substack.com
"California attorney Mark Lemley dropped Meta Platforms Inc. as a client in a high-profile copyright case because of CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s “descent into toxic masculinity and Neo-Nazi madness,” the Stanford University professor said on LinkedIn."
Meta Lawyer Lemley Quits AI Case Citing Zuckerberg 'Descent' (1)
California attorney Mark Lemley dropped Meta Platforms Inc. as a client in a high-profile copyright case because of CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s “descent into toxic masculinity and Neo-Nazi madness,” the Sta...
news.bloomberglaw.com
It was obviously a ridiculous number and lie from the WH Press Secretary the second she said it.
As an Immunologist who has studied Influenza I was worried about H5N1, I am horrified re: H5N9.

Our population has no pre-existing immunity.

I repeat, we have NO PRE-EXISTING immunity to H5N9.

(we have a little with H5N1 via H1N1 vaccines & infections)

www.cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influe...
Tests identify H5N9 avian flu at California duck farm
www.cidrap.umn.edu
Vaccines are life saving. The individual & public health benefit outweighs the risk more than nearly any other approved drug/med procedure.

Example: Tylenol is responsible for more deaths & hospitalizations than all vaccines combined.

#RFKJr made $Ms off of telling people otherwise.
Vaccines are life saving. Side effects in vaccines are minimal. The individual & public health benefit outweighs the risk more than nearly any other approved drug or medical procedure.

Example: Tylenol is responsible for more deaths and hospitalizations than all vaccines combined ever have been.
...was wildly unfounded.

The human population has NEVER developed herd immunity to ANY coronavirus.

This put millions of Americans who listened to him at risk.

You didn't need a PhD or MD to know this at the time, a simple google search would have sufficed.

He should stay in surgery.
Makary will always be synonymous with Malarkey for me.

I've spent decades in this field, I taught med students like him who thought surgery rules all and couldn't remember the basics of Immunology.

His incredibly dangerous claim in 2021 that you could develop herd immunity to SARS-CoV-2...
Don't forget Elon didn't invent any of the tech in his companies which were built with the government grants he's trying to get canceled.

Without homegrown competition, Americans will keep waking up to DeepSeek events.

Fund our #science, fund our #research, and fund our #smallbusiness
I left Twitter years ago. I don't think much of it will exist by this time next year.

Reminder

No one in history has blown $44B faster than Elon Musk while seemingly trying not to.

Trump put him in charge of US Gov Efficiency. 😅
EU medicines agency quits X, moves to Bluesky
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Monday it would no longer post on X and would use rival Bluesky instead, becoming the latest organisation to quit a social media platform that some have criticised for its content.
www.reuters.com
Has anyone ever blown $44B faster than Elon Musk?

(while ostensibly trying not to)

Probably not.

Good, now let's let him try to make our government more efficient.
It's farcical that #RFKJr was nominated at all.

Someone who has directly profited for decades attacking sound science with pseudoscience and is directly linked causing a deadly measles outbreak should never be in charge of HHS, this is a waste of everyone's time.
Please call and write to your senators and remind them that it doesn't matter what #RFKJr says in his hearings.

Relying on "his word" against a multi-decade track record of attacking life-saving vaccines among other atrocities is utter nonsense. You don't take people like that "at their word"
I am so sorry. I have written those.
About 90 Million Americans are on Medicaid
Identity politics was turned against Science and Scientists which resulted in millions of Americans dying or being permanently disabled, and significantly disrupting our economy. I'd be happy to pen a rebuttal since all of the American Scientists that work under the umbrella of HHS can not.
Meanwhile the National Cancer Institute remains shut down and all of it's grants from funding student researchers in cancer to large clinical trials are in limbo and may not be funded.