Berlin's virologist Christian Drosten, one of the world's leading experts at Covid-19, has become the target of a trend promoting conspiracy theory and opponents of strict protection measures in Germany to the point of threatening to kill him.
For weeks, those who have opposed the epidemic-related restrictions who raised their voices since last April during weekly demonstrations throughout the country are focusing their anger on the director of the Institute of Fevers at Charité University's large university hospital in Berlin.
Drusten was unknown a few months ago, but his name appears next to the name of Chancellor Angela Merkel, or Health Minister Jens Young, who has demanded his resignation as demonstrators who are a mixture of conspirators and right-wing extremists, but also anxious Germans.
Drosten, 40, found himself in the spotlight in the media spotlight after last January preparing his first simple test to detect "Covid-19" and make it available instantly all over the world.
It soon became one of the most appreciated votes in the country in this field. One of those consulted by Chancellor Merkel was a specialist in science, when she had to make a decision about quarantine.
Dorsten was also well known through the "public podcast" of public radio, through which he clarifies everything related to the emerging coronavirus and its dangers in simple terms addressed to anxious Germans.
However, at the end of April, Drewston revealed to the British newspaper, The Guardian, that he had received death threats. He said he had received a package containing a positive virus test sample with the message "Drink it and you will become immune."
The threats were so serious that Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said he was following "all this closely with the zero-tolerance strategy."
Since the start of the health crisis, the scientist, Drusten, who watches in the morning on his bike in a prestigious Berlin neighborhood, insists that "science has no political purpose."
He reiterates that he does not fear threats and does not heed his words when criticizing the "alleged experts" who publish "anything in the world", and thus they contribute to fueling conspiracy theories.