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Comment by perihelions | Hacker News Reader

I can't believe it's coincidence and accident that this Administration is assaulting medical research simultaneously on multiple fronts: here, with these attacks on universities, that seem to primarily target NIH research at America's most prestigious schools; the DOGE attacks, which are preferentially deleting medical workers, multiple entire offices at the FDA and the CDC; and that decision to elevate an HIV/AIDS denier to the office of HHS secretary.

I don't know what the intention is behind this systematic assault on medicine. It's incomprehensible.

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They view it as an assault on Universities, not "science". The thinking goes (you see this kind of rhetoric right here on HN) that The Radical Left has infested education in the United States and polluted the thinking of a generation of future leaders. "Woke Mind Virus", etc...

So to stamp that out, you need to get the kids to stop with the bad thinking. But you can't actually do that as the government because of the whole "shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech" thing.

So instead you hit their school instead. Make it so Columbia (in this case) knows that their funding depends on the grace of the government, and that if they want it back they need to start expelling or otherwise controlling the spreaders of the woke virus.

I am not sure why you are getting downvoted. This is the rationale given to me by the Trump supporters I know with postgraduate degrees

The downvote button is used by (too) many as the online equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears while loudly saying la la la la la, I can't hear you when confronted with facts they want to but can not rebuke.

They're being downvoted by Trump supporters who want Columbia to be pressured to limit liberal views on campus.

Keep'em sick, overworked, and broke. That'll keep protests to an absolute minimum.

It's crab mentality. The goal is to ransack the country and make life as bad for the rest of us as it has been for the die hard Trump voters. Our suffering is the point.

The intention? A country that is broken and looking to the fascists in charge to keep them safe from the same mess they created.

people keep trying to attribute a rationality beyond a selfish power/money grab... they are racist bullies looking to be the boot stomping on humanity's face forever while also looting the place six ways from Sunday along the way (just like Putin and his circle in Russia)

It's simply a narcissist's revenge

Incomprehensible? No, Trump is still bitter about losing his presidency due to Covid and is exacting revenge on science and the medical community.

Our government is creating its own problems.

I see nobody talking on _why_ the egg crisis happened. Some incompetent folks at DOGE killed off the workers responsible for vaccinations against the bird flu. Guess what happened once they were fired: birds got the bird flu.

That's the point of right wing governments. Spin it around and point fingers at the fault of others who weren't even involved. As long as you can paint a picture of an enemy, you'll stay in power.

Can you expand on this? Looking this up, most sources I find indicate the bird flu outbreak began in 2022[1], with a new strain particularly affecting egg producing chickens in Sept 2024[2], and affects many countries, not just the US [1]https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html [2]https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/us-egg-prices-see-...

I was a bit sceptical at first, but grandparent's claims seem to be true, at least in regards to the firing/rehiring part.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjev24184vjo

[2] https://apnews.com/article/usda-firings-doge-bird-flu-trump-...

[3] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/19/agriculture-...

[4] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fire...

[5] original source? https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/27/trump-fired-bird-fl...

Is that so? Looking at the table it seems this goes back to before Trump inauguration: https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-comm... My understanding is that upon a detection the entire flock is killed. A contributing factor why the US is disproportionately affected is the large flock size.

> My understanding is that upon a detection the entire flock is killed

I heard something like the avian flu spreads so fast that once one bird in a flock is detected to have the disease, it will eventually spread to the whole flock within 3 days.

Worse, if my memory serves me right, even neighboring flocks are killed in attempt to preemptively prevent the spread.

the egg situation isn't because of bird flu, although that's a factor

it's a monopoly problem

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