Those most passionate about capital-S Science are often aggressively anti-Trump, making them prone to accepting reports like this uncritically.

If the State Department spends a crazy sum maintaining the air quality app, questioning that expense is fair and pretending otherwise only undermines scientific credibility.

This article is a "pro-science" talking point because it admits embassies were told to keep monitors running and data sharing could resume if funding returned.

So at this point, there's not even necessarily a gap in the actual data. The only proof this shutdown was unavoidable comes from those who carried it out. Funny how that goes...