Medical Hesitance, Political Defiance

In episode 5, we take a look at political and medical efforts by groups and people to go their own way, from anti-vaxxers in California and the politically defiant in Texas and D.C. We start the episode with a dive into the FBI’s ongoing efforts to track down people who took part in the Jan. 6 insurrection and talk to former prosecutor Glenn Kirschner about how the courts are sentencing those convicted for taking part. Then we hear from several experts on the First Amendment battle between anti-vaccine activists and Facebook and how it affects vaccine misinformation spread across social media. In our last segment we bring you an update on the ongoing Texas legislative session, which both political aisles have dubbed as the most conservative yet. Special guests:Amesh Adalja, infectious disease expert and professor at Johns Hopkins UniversityPhil Napoli, public policy professor at Duke UniversitySharona Hoffman, professor and co-director of The Law-Medicine Center at Case Western Reserve UniversityJoshua Blank, research director for the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at AustinThis episode was produced by Kirk McDaniel. Intro music by The Dead Pens. Editorial staff is Ryan Abbott, Sean Duffy and Jamie Ross.