MSNBC host Chris Hayes criticized Fox News hosts Tuesday on his MSNBC show “All In” for segments calling into question the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.
Hayes said, “It is undeniably the case that one of the main issues we are facing in combatting this disease 18 months into this is a kind of radicalization of the American right against vaccination. For all of the back-and-forth between the White House and Facebook this week about how much responsibility the social network bears for Americans’ failure to have higher vaccination rates, there’s one other very obvious source of vaccine disinformation night in and night out that is not Facebook.”
After a montage of clips from Fox News, Hayes said, “Every one of those soundbites was from Fox News last night…They’re not true. I mean, there are people that are vaccinated who have gotten breakthrough cases, we know that, but by and large, it is a pandemic of unvaccinated. Media Matters found Fox undermined vaccination efforts in nearly 60% of all vaccination segments in a two-week period. It is almost always done in the most cowardly way imaginable. You saw it in those clips there. It’s not don’t get vaccinated. It’s ‘We’re just asking questions. We don’t take a position. Don’t take medical advice from people on TV. They’re trying to get you to comply, so you should not comply.'”
“It’s anti-pro-vax and all the while doing everything possible to stoke fears and misgivings about every other single intervention that could save lives, whether that was social distancing, closing bars and nightclubs and masking indoors,” he continued. “Because fundamentally, the dominant perspective of that network from the beginning of the pandemic has been, ‘Who cares if all of those people die? They’re old, poor, or sick anyway. One person who does care about old people dying is News Corp boss Rupert Murdoch. He is old and is one of the first people in the world to get the vaccine.”
Hayes concluded, “How do institutions to working areas keep people safe with a Delta variant and a safe, free, effective vaccine available? What to do? One answer is just make sure people are vaccinated. That’s precisely the kind of policy that Fox News has been rallying against, the heavy hand from above telling you what to do. ‘Vaccine passports.’ So you might be surprised to learn that’s exactly what the bosses at Fox are doing with their own building because they do understand the dangers of the situation, the nihilistic cynicism and preening idiocy of its hosts notwithstanding.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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