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February 15, 2006
Fundamentalism and Infectious Disease
Jack Woodall, Director of the Nucleus for the Investigation of Emerging Infectious Diseases in the Department of Medical Biochemistry at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, has a piece in the latest The Scientist in which he lists "The Hidden Dangers of Fundamentalism." His claim is that fundamentalism may be bad for your health. Not just because fundamentalist are often violent defenders of their beliefs but even more because some of their beliefs spread or encourage infectious disease.
He has a long list that includes the most recent outbreak of polio in Canada and the US (brought to North America by Christians who didn't believe in vaccination) and the 2002 cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe (Johanne Marange Apostolic Faith sect resisted treatment).
Woodall concludes,
The moral of this story: If you are a religious fundamentalist and care about your health, don't believe every rumor you hear, don't refuse vaccination or treatment, and keep your water supply clean.
Woodall is not claiming a direct casual relationship between Fundamentalism and infectious disease but he does seem to think, based on his conclusion, that fundamentalists may be more easily persuaded by rumor and dangerous health related doctrines of their particular sects. He article does not represent a controlled study and I'm sure that there are many secularists, myself included, who have dangerous health habits but it does occur to me that there may be a common underlying cause that is reflected in fundamentalist religious beliefs and unhealthy medical beliefs. Simply put, those who are open to fundamentalist beliefs of any stripe are also open to pseudoscience.
Posted by Duane Smith at February 15, 2006 12:10 PM | Read more on Religion |
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