The Germ Is The Alibi

What drives disease? With roots dating back to the mid-19th century, the germs vs. terrain debate often fuels discord. Sure, many have heard the discussion, which centers on whether specific microorganisms or “germs” are the primary cause of disease, and on the terrain theory, which holds that disease arises primarily from an imbalance or poor condition in the body’s internal environment, with germs being secondary or opportunistic. Often, the conversation pits someone wearing a lab coat against someone with a theology degree, and by the time the word evidence’ comes up, the audience has already split into tribes. Del Bigtree knows that. Thus, in a recent episode of The Highwire to discuss the topic, he opens the segment the way you open an honest dispute: by reading the heckling out loud—scripted, circular reasoning, cult followers, controlled opposition—because, Del shares, if people are going to accuse you of running from the argument, you might as well drag the argument into the light yourself.

For the discussion, which aired in late February 2026, Del invited three health freedom warriors who have each become their own kind of lightning rod in the post-COVID landscape. Joining Del were Alec Zeck, a former Army captain turned host of The Way Forward. Alec has built a remarkable following by pushing “show me the proof” questions into corners that the Big Pharma-funded mainstream won’t touch. Likewise, Kentucky chiropractor Dr. Ben Tapper shared his wisdom after having been publicly scorched for his vaccine dissent and refusal to retreat into polite language. And finally, Katie Collins, PA-C, joined the crew. Katie is conventionally trained but is also now known for translating medical controversy into parent-level clarity—especially for mothers who are trying to make sense of vaccines, informed consent, and what “risk” actually means when it comes to your most cherished possession, your child.

Together, the group seamlessly becomes one part courtroom challenge, one part clinical reality check, one part spiritual argument about the body’s design, all moderated by Del’s insistence that the only thing more dangerous than a germ is a paradigm that can’t survive being questioned.

As always, Del frames the question cleanly. Germ theory says illness comes from outside the body, meaning pathogens invade and then cause disease. Terrain theory holds that illness arises from within the body—the condition of the host and the internal environment are primary. Then Del does what mainstream medicine rarely does on camera: he treats the premise as debatable, not sacred. After asking him for the typical spiel on the topic, Alec (who clearly possesses a wealth of knowledge on the topic) answers like a man trying to endure cross-examination rather than win applause. If you’re making a cause-and-effect claim, he argues, you have to prove the independent variable. In the germ theory framework, that variable is the virus. Alec’s point is blunt, explaining that the “virus causes disease” claim hasn’t been empirically demonstrated as the public assumes it has, and until that is shown, we’re essentially building castles in the air.

Dr. Ben Tapper comes at it from the clinic and the gut, not from behind the microscope. He doesn’t deny microbes exist. Instead, he questions the hierarchy. If germs were the prime mover in the neat, deterministic way the public story implies, he argues, we’d all be dead—because we’re surrounded by microbes constantly. His analogy is as unromantic as it is effective: trash attracts flies. Did the flies create the trash, or did the trash create the conditions that drew the flies? He’s arguing that sickness is often a body under burden—a system adapting until it can’t—more than it is a clean “invader wins” story. That dovetails with his broader theme, which notes that health lives and dies in the nervous system, in stress response, and in what your body is being asked to tolerate day after day.

Then Del drops the terrain framework into a picture that we can easily feel. He describes a practitioner from his Boulder days who told him to think of health as centrifugal “core energy.” In other words, we are born so balanced that we can’t even see the wobble, but then life starts taking bites out of that center. Examples include fluoride in the water supply, those beers and cigarettes as a young adult, then the slow drift outward until our core is dissipated and we are suddenly “vulnerable to all sorts of things.” Del ties it to his own lived experience, sharing that when he’s exercising, eating well, and steady, colds enter his home and pass through without sticking. On the flip side, when he’s feeling stressed and depleted, negative exposures hit differently. It’s essentially terrain theory rendered as a physics lesson. Specifically, weaken the center, and everything has more room to land.

As a mother herself, the wonderful Katie Collins, PA-C, keeps the conversation real and tethered to what parents actually ask. Her motivation to share information about natural health and vaccines is directly driven by questions from friends and family. She’s trying to align the theory with patterns. For example, if someone insists viruses don’t exist, she asks what do you do with familiar presentations—rashes that look a certain way, varicella, the visible landscape that seems to shift with interventions? That question matters because it’s the difference between an intellectual stance and something a mother can actually use when her child is sick.

As the conversation evolves, Del’s “big question,” as he puts it, is right there with Katie’s realism, and it’s where the conversation starts to braid into the modern environment. He references Tom Cowan’s work on contagion and the idea that new technologies—including, in particular, ever-evolving radio frequencies—coincided with the appearance of certain illnesses when they were introduced. Make no mistake, the implication isn’t subtle. No indeed. Without a doubt, what we label as “infectious disease” may, at least in some cases, be an expression of environmental impact. In other words, something exists that is altering the terrain so dramatically that symptoms follow it. Yet, we mislabel that trigger because, hey, it’s easier (until perhaps post-COVID) to blame an invisible germ than a visible (and corrupt) system. Hmmm. Makes perfect sense.

That intriguing thread resurfaces more sharply a bit later in the discussion, when Del plays a clip of Dr. Thomas Cowan saying the quiet part out loud: that the “pro-vax” and “anti-vax” sides often share the same unexamined premise—viruses exist and cause disease—and the real line of inquiry is upstream. Cowan challenges the whole structure: show me how you know a virus exists, how you purified it, characterized it, sequenced it, and proved causation through exposure in a normal way—then re-isolate it. Del doesn’t bristle; he answers plainly that he isn’t running away from the question.

And this is where it becomes clear that Del isn’t simply a champion of one side. He explains why he hasn’t made “viruses don’t exist” the centerpiece of The HighWire. Not because he thinks terrain is irrelevant—he clearly doesn’t—but because he’s fighting in arenas where outcomes have to be measurable. Meaning in lawsuits, policy, and institutional accountability. Del read an email exchange about inviting Cowan and Dr. Andrew Kaufman (who became widely known during COVID for arguing that SARS-CoV-2, and more broadly, viruses as typically understood, haven’t been properly proven as causative agents of disease) to the studio specifically because The HighWire cites sources live and wants the debate done clearly, on record. Then he states what serves as a mission statement: he is “dedicated to eradicating man-made disease,” and his goal is to ensure his kids never live in a world where they’re forced to be vaccinated. That’s his north star, and it’s why he has played the game by the rules of the arenas where he can actually change the rules. It is also why he created ICAN.

The entire over 2-hour conversation is engaging and super interesting. And it is that tension—between philosophical purity and tactical realism—that is the most honest part of the discussion. Because this debate isn’t only about microscopy, it’s about power. Think about it. If the dominant theory is that disease is an external invader, then the default “solution” becomes external too. Regardless of how this ends, we see that truth plain as day right now with profit-driven pharmaceuticals, products, mandates, surveillance, injections (vaccines, biologics, etc.), compliance, and so on. The public becomes a patient class, and “public health” becomes a permission slip for the deep state.

So here we are. If terrain is central to this debate, then the argument naturally shifts toward what people themselves can control internally. And, in turn, institutions can’t monetize as neatly. That means evaluating the quality of our nutrition, sleep, exposure to sunlight, the reduction of toxins in our bodies, stress response, and nervous system regulation. It puts the focal point of control back in the body, and it quietly starves the fear economy that so desperately wants to control us. No matter the outcome of this debate, the fear economy must be starved into oblivion.

Why? Because fear is the quiet fifth speaker at the discussion table. Indeed, fear is the shadow behind every reference to the last few years—behind what people were told, what got enforced, and the price tag attached to dissent. So wherever one might land in this fight—germs, terrain, or that uneasy strip of ground in between—the takeaway isn’t complicated. If a paradigm can’t tolerate honest questions, especially the kind that demand clear cause-and-effect proof, it has no right to call itself “settled science.” Because that isn’t science, that is doctrine. Considering all of the God-given miracles of the human body, modern medicine doesn’t get to ask the public for blind belief fueled by fear when the tab is long overdue for hard evidence.