Last month, the Philadelphia skeptic organization, PhACT, presented a live-streamed event at their monthly meeting: an interview of mass psychogenic illness expert and Havana Syndrome critic and sociologist Robert Bartholomew. For nearly an hour, I questioned Bartholomew about his opinion of Havana Syndrome, followed by questions from the session attendees.
Bartholomew’s attitude on the subject, at least as of several years ago, may be easily deduced from the subtitle of the book he cowrote with Robert W. Baloh in 2020: Havana Syndrome: Mass Psychogenic Illness and the Real Story Behind the Embassy Mystery and Hysteria.
For those unfamiliar with this topic, here is a brief overview of Havana Syndrome.
Beginning in late 2016, the U.S. government claimed there were attacks against American embassy personnel and their families in Havana, Cuba, by unknown forces using unknown weapons. Over the next five years, the scope of these attacks, initially claimed to be “sonic,” broadened to include embassy staff, intelligence agents, and military personnel and their families stationed in a growing number of countries around the world.
The symptoms of these attacks were initially described as “unexplained health incidents.” These maladies eventually and collectively came to be known as Havana Syndrome. The list of symptoms is broad and includes ear pain, feeling pressure in the head, tinnitus, visual problems, vertigo, nausea, cognitive difficulties, insomnia, fatigue, dizziness, and even brain trauma. The mysterious, unidentified weaponry blamed for these “neurological attacks” has been diverse and morphed over time. Supposedly culpable weapons have included (but are not limited to) ultrasound, infrasound, pesticides, pulsed electromagnetic energy, and microwaves.
I became aware of these claims early on, even before the name “Havana Syndrome” had been coined. At that point in 2018, the Wikipedia article about all this was named “Sonic Attacks in Cuba” reflecting the then-current ubiquitous media reports claiming victims had suffered brain injuries from a sonic weapon of unknown origin. As my skeptical alarm bells sounded loudly whenever I read the credulous media reports, I reached out to an expert on the subject of mass psychogenic illness for an interview for my online Skeptical Inquirer column. After discussing the situation with Dr. Bartholomew, my skepticism on the subject was only reinforced. Bartholomew called the claims of attacks “science fiction” and expertly explained what was actually going on all within the bounds of the well-understood phenomena of mass psychogenic illness, something he had studied for decades.
As a result of my interview, I thought that the truth was so clear that it would be accepted in short order by everyone. I was sadly mistaken. Years later, the claims have not abated. America has a new administration, pledged to follow science, yet it has just doubled-down on the Trump-era position solidified in late 2017 by the president at a press conference: “I do believe Cuba’s responsible. I do believe that. And it’s a very unusual attack, as you know. But I do believe Cuba is responsible.”
Fast-forward almost five years, and the Biden administration’s position is demonstrated by Public Law 117 – 46 signed into law by the president in October 2021, authorizing financial support for Havana Syndrome victims. It is named the “Helping American Victims Afflicted by Neurological Attacks Act” (i.e., the HAVANA Act). So, the reality of “victims” of “Neurological Attacks” connected with Cuba is now part of U.S. law.
The American news media has been largely credulous on this topic from the outset. Case in point: this past February, CBS’s 60 Minutes ran a report claiming that American citizens at the White House itself have now been attacked with mysterious weapons. Despite there being scientists and medical specialists readily available to counter these claims, including the outspoken Bartholomew, there wasn’t a hint of skepticism in the entire half-hour report.
In the episode, several Havana Syndrome “victims” were interviewed, and the former National Security Adviser John Bolton was asked if Havana Syndrome symptoms have been caused by deliberate attacks. He said “I don’t think there is any other hypothesis.” More troubling, the current CIA director was asked why his agency had not gotten to the bottom of the attacks after all these years. William Burns’s response was: “It’s a very complicated issue.”
It was with the 60 Minutes report fresh in my mind that I interviewed Bartholomew for PhACT. I wondered if stronger evidence had surfaced to strengthen the attack claims since we last spoke. Perhaps Bartholomew had changed his opinion that the symptoms are psychogenic in nature, and now agrees that actual attacks may have happened.
Spoiler: No, he has not—not one bit. Bartholomew maintains that Havana Syndrome is, to put it bluntly, a case of “political blunders, sloppy science, and bad journalism.” Years have passed without any evidence of actual attacks being uncovered, and the validity of the original evidence has only withered upon sustained scrutiny. The spread of the claims of attacks to so many other locations around the world just reinforces the psychogenic explanation.
In our interview, Bartholomew discussed the Havana Syndrome claims in detail, criticized the shoddy science published in supposedly reliable medical journals, and lamented the credulous reporting done by the media concerning this story right up to the present time. He deconstructed the two Journal of the American Medical Association studies by University of Pennsylvania neurologists claiming that some victims suffered brain injury, as well as the 2020 report by the National Academy of Sciences that validated the attack hypothesis by concluding “directed, pulsed radio frequency energy appears to be the most plausible mechanism in explaining these cases.”
He also discussed the politics that initiated (and perpetuated) Havana Syndrome over two American administrations, and I asked him about the recent CIA report that discussed more than a thousand reported claims. I played excerpts from the recent 60 Minutes report, and Bartholomew commented on each one.
Importantly, to put Havana Syndrome in context, Bartholomew outlined several historic cases of documented mass psychogenic illness around the world, covered in his book in detail, and that all have similarities to the Havana Syndrome situation.
One fascinating case of special interest to Philadelphia residents, is that of Ben Franklin’s armonica. This musical instrument, invented by the Founding Father, transitioned in a short time from being perceived as having healing powers to one believed to cause serious illness to its players and listeners. (The placebo effect, the nocebo effect, and fallacious thinking about cause-and-effect all played a part).
Bartholomew summarizes the Havana Syndrome situation as follows: “Humans have a remarkable capacity for self-deception.”
If you are on the fence regarding Havana Syndrome or if you are confident that it is due to attacks made around the world by unknown nefarious parties using unknown weapons, I urge you to watch the entire interview to get the details of the side of the story you do not get from the news. The PhACT video is available here. Better yet, read Bartholomew’s book. If that doesn’t convince you, I don’t know what can.
And if you happen to have CIA Director Burns, or anyone else involved with this fiasco, in your contact list, please, please, please forward this article to them. Yes, John Bolton, there is another hypothesis! And it is the only one that makes any sense at all.
Acknowledgements
I want to thank the Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking (PhACT) for hosting this important interview, and I want to especially thank Dr. Bartholomew for his participation.
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