“I’ve never heard anyone claim that the theory of pathogenic organisms is the complete guide to diseases caused by pathogens, but if you aren’t willing to think there are pathogens, or that they cause disease… you’re like the people who argued that women who died in childbirth due to being subjected to surgical instruments that were used to dissect dead people a few hours earlier — you’re saying those instruments didn’t need to be sterilized. That’s not an argument. It’s a kind of idiocy. If you think diseases aren’t caused by pathogens, prove your theory — because the causal relationship between pathogens and disease is absolutely proven… however (necessarily) incomplete it may be.”

— an anonymous informant