There are decisive moments in the life of nations when truth, that cornerstone of civilized order, ceases to be sought as an absolute good and becomes moldable material in the hands of those who wield temporal power. The COVID pandemic was, unfortunately, one of those moments. Science, traditionally understood as a rigorous method and an intellectual discipline grounded in methodological doubt, was transformed into a tool serving circumstantial agendas, turning specialists into official spokespersons and governments into exclusive interpreters of reality.
The merit of researchers was never in question. With seriousness and dedication, they sought answers in a context of global uncertainty. The problem lay in the political appropriation of that effort. What should have been an open, plural, and informed dialogue became an imposed dogma. Dissent, instead of being encouraged as a natural part of scientific progress, came to be seen as a moral offense to the community and almost a civic sin.
A convenient selectivity of facts took hold. Studies were promoted or ignored depending on their usefulness to the dominant narrative. Divergent opinions were silenced through mechanisms ranging from explicit censorship to subtle delegitimization. An illusion was created that science speaks with a single voice when, in reality, it advances through intellectual confrontation, debate, and contradiction. This fiction, repeated insistently, gradually eroded institutional credibility. The average citizen did not lose trust in science itself but rather in the intermediaries who instrumentalized it.
The pandemic also revealed the fragility of academia and regulatory bodies—sometimes too dependent on external funding, political pressures, or prevailing ideological conventions. Scientific autonomy, which should be a pillar of modern society, was diminished in the face of the need to align with an official narrative designed to standardize behaviors and justify exceptional measures.
Perplexity becomes even more evident when we observe a phenomenon that common sense cannot ignore. For decades, the approval of any vaccine required long processes of study, verification, successive clinical trials, and an almost ritual prudence—considered indispensable to safeguarding public health. It was always said that safety required time, that science did not admit haste, and that responsible research could not bow to political urgency. Yet with the so-called COVID vaccines and their successive boosters, that traditional rigor seemed to dissolve within mere months.
Formulations, authorizations, and campaigns appeared at a speed that, in earlier times, would have been considered incompatible with the classical standards of preventive medicine. This is not meant to question the effort of scientists, but rather to highlight the evident contraction of time. What once required years—if not decades—was suddenly condensed into extraordinarily short intervals. Such discrepancy sparked legitimate incredulity and fueled the perception that science was being shaped by political demands and media pressure, drifting away from the prudence that has always defined serious biomedical research.
The moral damage was profound. The State demanded absolute obedience to measures that changed almost weekly. Official communication oscillated between alarmism and infantilization. The goal was not to clarify, but to direct. Individual responsibility was replaced by bureaucratic paternalism that treated adults as intellectually incapable subjects. Science was presented as an indisputable revelation, when it should have been shown as an ongoing effort toward improvement.
Looking back, one concludes that the greatest risk to public health did not come only from pathogens but from the manipulation of institutions tasked with protecting the dignity of free thought. A society that allows science to be instrumentalized paves the way for new abuses, new restrictions, and new forms of social control disguised as technical benevolence.
The lesson is old, yet remains relevant. Scientific truth demands freedom, not convenience. Citizens need transparency, not slogans. And the State must cultivate humility, for no government is strong enough to uphold a fiction without simultaneously destroying the trust of those it governs.
César DePaço
Entrepreneur and Philanthropist
Honorary Consul of Portugal from 2014 to 2020
Founder and CEO of Summit Nutritionals International Inc.
President of the DePaço Foundation
Unwavering supporter of Law Enforcement and Conservative Principles
Source: LusoAmericano