The Politicization Of A Pandemic : Science & The Public's Health Under Attack
"I am not a political operative, I am a physician who was, until today, charged with protecting the people of Tennessee ... against preventa
āFiscus said tension with GOP lawmakers escalated when she publicized a public document on Tennesseeās "Mature Minor Doctrine,ā a state Supreme Court case ruling from 1987 that states Tennesseans 14 to 18 years old may be treated āwithout parental consent unless the physician believes that the minor is not sufficiently mature to make his or her own health care decisions.ā
āWithin days, legislators were contacting TDH asking questions about the memo with some interpreting it as an attempt to undermine parental authority,ā Fiscus said, adding that her conduct was called āreprehensibleā by a Tennessee lawmaker.
āThat member went on to call for the 'dissolving and reconstitutionā of the Department of Health in the midst of a pandemic where one out of every 542 Tennesseans has died from Covid-19 on their watch and less than 38 percent of Tennesseans have been vaccinated,ā Fiscus wrote.
As of Monday, state and federal data showed 38 percent of Tennesseans were fully vaccinated against Covid-19, lagging behind much of the nation.
āWe now have our most hesitant population being rural male conservative whites, who really do hang their hat on this political ideology that Covid-19 isnāt real, isnāt a threat, or that getting the vaccine somehow props up the left-wing part of our political system,ā she said.
Fiscus told Hayes that the greatest challenges the state faces with raising its vaccination rate were the āpoliticization of public health and in peopleās choosing not to protect themselves.ā
