TWiV Special: Toppling the anti-vaxxer pyramid with "flu-shot cheerleader" Desiree Townsend

This Week in Virology

Vincent Racaniello

Virology, Microbiology, Medicine, Virus, Racaniello, Microbe, Infection, Vincent, Infectious, Pathogen, Science & Medicine, Twiv

4.8 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 11 August 2023

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Vincent speaks with Desirée Townsend about how she felt used and indoctrinated by the anti-vaxx movement, the science surrounding her autoimmune disorder, and why she is no longer the “flu shot cheerleader,” but a cheerleader for flu shots. Subscribe (free): Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, RSS, email Become a patron of TWiV! Links for this episode Desiree on Instagram and LinkedIn ‘Flu-shot cheerleader’ speaks out (NBC) ‘Flu-shot cheerleader’ back with a warning (NBC) Timestamps by Jolene. Thanks! Intro music is by Ronald Jenkees Send your virology questions and comments to twiv@microbe.tv

Transcript

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0:00.0	This week in virology, the podcast about viruses, the kind that make you sick.
0:10.4	From microbe TV, this is TWIV, this week in virology, a special episode recorded on August
0:18.4	8th, 2023. I'm Vincent Racken Yellow, and you're listening to the podcast, all about viruses.
0:27.1	Today, I have a slightly different episode for you. As you know, normally we talk about
0:34.0	papers here and science here on TWIV, but as you know now, and then we do talk about vaccines,
0:41.9	we talk about the so-called anti-vaccine movement, most recently RFK juniors
0:49.9	incorrect statements about vaccines, and often we don't talk about some of the people involved in
0:58.5	it. So today, I have a guest who has been the victim of the anti-vaccine movement, and I thought
1:07.7	it would be interesting for our listeners to hear her story. Coming to us from Irvine, California,
1:15.8	Desiree Townsend. Welcome to TWIV Desiree. Thank you. I'm so happy to be here. Thanks for having me
1:22.2	on today. You have nice weather out there? Yes, it's beautiful. It is a 70 degree, 70 Fahrenheit
1:31.1	degree day here in Irvine, California. I'm actually coming to you from UC Irvine. I'm staying with
1:38.1	family, and the dogs can be quite annoying with their bark, so I decided to come on campus today
1:44.2	and record. Well, it's interesting. You see Irvine because I know a couple of virologists there,
1:50.9	as you know, and you've even taken virology classes with one of them, right? Yes, one of them
1:56.7	was my professor who's actually been very supportive of me throughout this entire media process.
2:05.7	Dr. Michael Buckmeyer. He was my virologist professor for both virology, the basic introduction,
2:16.0	and then viral pathogenesis, so I took two courses with him. He's a great guy.
2:21.7	So you've listened to TWIV before I introduced you? Yes, so I started listening in college.
2:27.6	So I have to give a shout out, I'm sorry, to Dr. Paul Gershon's lab at UC Irvine here.
2:35.2	And to Yeva, Christine, and Josh, and of course Dr. Gershon. I used to work in their lab.
2:42.4	I did bioinformatics, so I used to take the mass spec data and run it through an algorithm
	...

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