Hungarian physician Ignaz Semmelweis couldn’t stand his colleagues’ filth; their putrid, bloody apparel and hands he reasoned, were the source of the puerperal fever, the deadly infection plaguing 19th century Europe’s maternity wards. His solution: a revolutionary idea. Wash hands and clean doctors’ and nurses’ filthy clothing while tending to pregnant mothers and their newborn babies. Cleanliness, soap and water held puerperal fever at bay. For a while.

His scientific pursuit was met by fierce opposition from his medical peers, they refused to abandon their old habits. Ostracized, he would die a lonely man. We now know about the germ theory of disease and routinely use antiseptic practices.

Semmelweis’s story illustrates the state American scientific practice finds itself in today, having been set upon by many who, like Semmelweis’s opponents, reject science, mistaking opinions for knowledge — their main asset being unrestrained shouting, spewing nonsense not based on any data or research. Most of it, communicated through social media, has in fact little use or value.

Men and women running amok, among beakers, jars, and Bunsen burners, have no scientific backgrounds; their best known qualification is their ability at demolition. My scientific colleagues stand aghast, watching the carnage of American science, apparently unable to resist or fight back, which, for the smartest men and women on earth, is quite astonishing. American scientific endeavor, like a great many other national enterprises, finds itself aggressively set upon by individuals and groups who declare their ignorance with pride. It’s truly astounding, that men who for decades have traded on nonsensical, illogical ideas now hold sway at the highest spaces of our government. If the essence of scientific discovery is to build upon existing knowledge, these folks’ ideas are to subtract and destroy.

Non-scientists only see the outer contours of the house that science built. They do not — they cannot — appreciate the difficulties, the disparities that exist in science education, practice and management. Unfortunately, the siloing that exists among different institutions and varying scientific disciplines makes the scientific edifice weak and easier to attack. It is a house built on a rather infirm foundation; a house men like Trump/Musk can literally swipe off existence. For decades, the weakness of the scientific establishment has worried me; I’ve written a great deal about it. Little has changed, scientists are deaf to what’s not in their immediate sphere of interest.

To our current administration, science and scientific inquiry connote a leftist, liberal bent; an indication of the administration’s unwillingness to pursue logic and reason. Truthfully though, science is ideologically neither left nor right. Scientists can and do have conservative and liberal convictions. However, to be true to scientific discipline, we must adhere to scientific principles. Robert Kennedy’s anti-vaccine crusade is just that, a crusade; Don Quixote flailing at windmills.

Why is the Donald Trump administration willy-nilly attacking scientific institutions within HHS? CDC and NIH have been dismantled. NSF, NOAA, NASA, FEMA, FAA, FDA — organizations that monitor the well-being of society and have significant import for Colorado — are on the chopping block. I think the answer lies in faith and hope that the government of the people will always do what’s best for the people. That the government of the people will be directed by people of good sense: logical minds and good judgment.

Scientists and institutions of higher learning — where a large part of American research takes place — have eschewed politics; they were always above it. I have for long advocated for more scientist legislators. To see Sen. Bill Cassidy, a doctor, ask Robert F Kennedy to promise not to oppose vaccination if confirmed to HHS secretary, was gratifying.

This nation’s legislatures should be filled with scientist legislators; most often our lawyer legislators don’t serve the nation’s scientific needs adequately. Our institutions — targets of Trump’s ire, mood changes, flexed muscles — must find ways to defend themselves by cooperating with each other against current and future assaults. APLU — Public and Land Grant Universities — as well as schools like Harvard, Yale, and Columbia have to defend themselves against tumultuous futures.

Agencies to me are not blind darkened buildings, but people — scientists, smart, highly educated specialists who tirelessly toil to keep us healthy. To decapitate the NIH is to go blindly forth, without feeling the pulse of future pandemics. Ebola that keeps raising its head in various parts of equatorial Africa is but a tame prelude. New epidemics and pandemics are in the offing, given our unpredictable environment. Please listen.

Pius Kamau, M.D., a retired general surgeon, is president of the Aurora-based Africa America Higher Education Partnerships; co-founder of the Africa Enterprise Group and an activist for minority students ‘STEM education. He is a National Public Radio commentator, a Huffington Post blogger, a past columnist for Denver dailies and is featured on the podcast, “Never Again.”