‘Pakistanis won’t kill their patients’: Row over anti‑vaccine advocate calling out medical staff because they are foreigners

A row erupted involving diversity in medical training after an anti‑vaccine campaigner criticised a Texas hospital residency programme for having only international graduates.Mary Talley Bowden posted on X where she commented on the incoming internal medicine residents at Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas in Beaumont. Her post mentioned that all 13 first‑year internal medicine trainees were international medical graduates, with six of them from medical schools in Pakistan. Some of them were also from India. It drew attention because of the complete absence of US medical graduates in that particular group.The residency programme is based at a community hospital that serves a large regional population and fills its positions through the National Resident Matching Programme. Publicly available information shows the names and medical schools of the 2025 intake. The class includes doctors from Jordan, the United Kingdom, Syria, Egypt, India and Pakistan, all of whom graduated from non‑US medical schools.Bowden is a Houston‑based board‑certified ear, nose and throat surgeon, founder of BreatheMD and a well‑known advocate against vaccine mandates.Her post drew a reply from commentator Richard Hanania on social media. In response, Hanania wrote: “It’s funny because this woman is an anti‑vaxxer. At least the Pakistanis won’t kill their patients.”The exchange touched on sensitive issues around medical training, immigration and patient safety. Social media users said Bowden’s post unfairly singled out doctors because they trained abroad and fuelled stereotypes about international medical graduates. Historical match data shows the Beaumont internal medicine programme has a high proportion of international graduates compared with the national average, which typically sees about 44 per cent of internal medicine positions filled by international medical graduates.