In a 2005 article published in the Journal, Madeleine Cosman argued that illegal immigrants were carriers of disease, and that immigrants and “anchor babies” were launching a “stealthy assault on [American] medicine.”[56] In the article, Cosman claimed that “Suddenly, in the past 3 years America has more than 7,000 cases of leprosy” because of illegal aliens.[56] The journal’s leprosy claim was cited and repeated by Lou Dobbs as evidence of the dangers of illegal immigration.[52][57]
However, publicly available statistics show that the 7,000 cases of leprosy occurred during the past 30 years, not the past 3 as Cosman claimed.[58] James L. Krahenbuhl, director of the U.S. government’s leprosy program, stated that there had been no significant increase in leprosy cases, and that “It [leprosy] is not a public health problem—that’s the bottom line.”[57] National Public Radio reported that the Journal article “had footnotes that did not readily support allegations linking a recent rise in leprosy rates to illegal immigrants.”[52] The article’s erroneous leprosy claim was pointed out by 60 Minutes,[59] National Public Radio,[52] and the New York Times[57] but has not been corrected by the Journal.
Critics have objected that many of her controversial claims on immigration and medicine are not authoritative due her lack of credentials.[16] In discussions of medical issues, she is often referred to as “Dr. Madeleine Cosman”, though her doctorates were in literature and law. The title, though technically accurate, has led some to the mistaken impression that she has a medical degree[17] and therefore medical expertise. For example, a reporter on Lou Dobbs’ CNN program[18] had cited as facts Cosman’s claims that there were, over a period of three years, 7,000 cases of leprosy in the United States and that many of these were the result of illegal immigrants bringing the disease into the country. Dobbs has since rejected these claims as unsubstantiated, calling Cosman “a wackjob”.[19] Cosman has also been accused[20] of making racist claims in her criticism of immigration. For example, railing against Mexican immigrant men, she made the following ominous warning: “Recognize that most of these bastards molest girls under age twelve, some as young as age five, others age three. Although, of course, some specialize in boys, some specialize in nuns, some are exceedingly versatile and rape little girls age eleven and women up to age seventy-nine.”[21] She goes on to attribute the behavior to allegedly lenient Mexican laws concerning rape.
