Matteo Bassetti is fed up, saying on Pomeriggio Cinque that “I don’t sell anything via social media or the internet”, that in 2022 they started stealing his face to sell online concoctions, and especially the elderly believe it, and try explaining to them that “that is a fake Bassetti, maybe modified with artificial intelligence”. He is right, health is no joke: one thing is asking for money to free hostages in the Middle East with Minister Crosetto’s voice, another is selling fake miraculous diabetes drugs.
The point is the side effects of celebrity: does Brad Pitt know that he was “appalled” after finding out that a French woman had spent over $850,000 to chat with a scam-clone who courted her, does Scarlett Johansson know that she was “shocked, angry, and incredulous” after listening to the demo version of her voice released by Open Ai. But if Bassetti finds himself there, at the zenith between Hollywood and the Ministry of Defense, where it is difficult to distinguish the original from the copy, it’s also partly his own doing.
Bassetti’s Appeal in Pajamas
Let’s talk about the second life of virologists. It was in 2022 when Matteo Bassetti shed his role as an infectious disease specialist and threw a mask in the air amid nature shouting VIVA LA VIDA, after delighting us with the hit “Yes yes vax” on Un giorno da pecora. Since then, Bassetti has cultivated his saga with the dedication of a cultural heritage servant.
Today it is very difficult not to know even what pajamas the President of the Liguria Health Council goes to bed in: a video was released where the infectious disease specialist, nestled among the pillows of the Rex Hotel Residence in Genoa, owned by his wife, shares his latest message to the nation: sleeping is good, as confirmed by a Harvard study, “at least six or seven hours per night”. On the contrary, messing around with the phone in bed is very bad: the screen light interferes with the circadian rhythm, altering melatonin and cortisol production.
Bassetti against Trump, Non-Stick Pans, and Salmon
Bassettology is a multifaceted science, communicated day by day through selfies in sunglasses, live streams from the bed, and in the aisles. He can afford it, “today, in my field, I have the strongest curriculum in Italy, with an H-Index of 115 which, if allowed, is truly excessive. The highest among infectious disease specialists is 10-15 points below…”, he recalls to Corriere.
So, while taking a photo in Venice with the caption “If I had to look for a word that replaces ‘music’, I could only think of Venice. Quote. Friedrich Nietzsche”, and having breakfast in Genoa, “What was the saying? Don’t let the farmer know how good cheese is with pears. You could say don’t let the Genoese know how good focaccia is with cappuccino”, in his free time, Bassetti takes on enemies like Trump (“The third death in the US from #measles shows that arrogance, inconsistency, and ignorance currently govern the United States”), “non-stick pans”, and salmon: smoked puts everyone at risk of listeria, and in general, strolling through Boccadasse on a “wonderful day”, it’s the animal most pumped with antibiotics.
Bassetti Against Everyone
But many enemies bring much honor, as Bassetti never misses an opportunity to have some: “Antonella Viola is a pleasant woman, but she has no background in infectious diseases. Palù is a phenomenon in the lab but has never seen a sick person. Pregliasco? A professor of Hygiene”. Then there are about a hundred anti-vaxxers reported and the association of specialized trainees sued. He knows that as an infectious disease specialist, there is no room for debate, and as Bassetti, it works, receives advances, “a lot, especially from the male world. Social media is a world”.
In the world of social media, Bassetti shares information about sexually transmitted diseases, viral infections, norovirus, teaches how to defrost meat, warns about the dangers of snacking from a vending machine, and shares that pouring water into a glass, according to a Japanese study, “carbonated water reduces glucose levels, speeds up metabolism, and helps in weight loss”.
Bassetti in the Kitchen, Bookstore, Stadium, and Aft
Then, as antiviral gums arrive, he gets into the kitchen to cook “pasta with five or maybe six different types of tomatoes… copied and replicated… in any case, you will see the complete recipe on my YouTube channel”, and a minute later, he gives lessons on tuberculosis. In between, there’s a humble promotion of his book Being a Doctor, “Today I received the most beautiful compliment from a colleague for this book: ‘I finished reading your latest book ‘Being a Doctor’. I think every doctor should read it to understand what empathy means in our profession. Congratulations and a hug'”, and a “tutorial on how to join my new WhatsApp channel… waiting for the YouTube tutorial😉 WILL YOU JOIN?”.
Radio Bassetti ranges from passions (“we conceded the most ridiculous goal in the history of world football. Football is played with (good) feet, not with words and protests…”) to denouncing violence against doctors, explaining liposuction and spleen rupture surgeries. Last summer, he debunked the social media trend of cooking with seawater collected from the back of the boat, “where there is fuel, bilge pumps that contain oil and other materials, but there are also boat drains with excrements”, and that of snacking on synthetic meat, “antibiotics and vaccines are produced in laboratories, not steaks”.
Who Sleeps Doesn’t Catch Fish but Follows Bassetti
Never satisfied with followers, the all-season virologist and “as long as they talk about it” has decided a few days ago to comment on the death of actor Val Kilmer due to pneumonia with a divisive “Definitely the year of global pneumonia limelight”. Naive obituary? Announcement of a new pandemic? “Of course, in life one must avoid mixing medications. But also, that life doesn’t become a mix of science, pots, talk shows, hotels, reality TV, and rhinestone glasses in an attempt to chase lost visibility,” commented Luigi Mascheroni about the virus “unstoppable, of narcissism”.
Unfazed, Bassetti is unstoppable, at the vortex of activities and statements, the only thing missing from Bassetti’s whirlwind is classical dance or astrophysics, but let’s not limit providence. Who sleeps doesn’t catch fish, but if you follow Bassetti on his channels, you won’t fall for scammers or eat rat fish like Fantozzi, Filini, and “someone in Italy who eats nutria… without knowing the health risks”, you’ll know that “after 17 hours of wakefulness, cognitive abilities are similar to those of a person with a blood alcohol level of 0.05%. After 24 hours, the situation worsens, reaching 0.10%, the legal limit for driving”. In his net, only healthy fish.
