Dr. Scott Atlas, the neuroradiologist and former Fox “News” commentator who’s become President Trump’s key advisor on coronavirus response even though he has no public health or epidemiology background, said that the medical professionals from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health have “limited” perspectives on how to deal with the pandemic, and he claimed that, despite Trump’s public speculation on “herd mentality (immunity),” it’s never been discussed in the White House.
In an interview with Unherd, Atlas bragged about being the lone voice speaking out against the advice of people experienced in public health and virology, saying that people are speaking out against his position because he sides with the president.
“When I [went to work for Trump] though, I knew I would be vilified, because in the US there are a lot of people who think that this President is radioactive, so there is a massive destruction that ensues immediately when you associate with this President,” Atlas said. “It’s a very sad statement on America, on American culture, on the world — these people are blinded, even scientists, to the data because they despise the political side of this. And they have a massive ego, and can’t admit they’re wrong. Ok I’m a contrarian, I’m used to being a contrarian, I’m proud to be an outlier when the inliers are wrong.”
Atlas stated his disagreement with universal masking mandates, mischaracterizing the proposed rules and their function, claiming no scientific evidence supports universal masking.
“Things like universal mask wearing — honestly that is contrary to the science as well as common sense, to think that you need to wear a mask when you’re in the middle of the desert, when you’re in the car on your own, when you’re bicycling through St James’s Park,” Atlas claimed. “This kind of stuff is nonsense. There is no science to support universal masking.”
Atlas’s claim is debunked by numerous medical institutions and scientific researchers, including the CDC. His mischaracterization of wearing a mask when you’re alone and not around others is a strawman argument.
Atlas also demeaned accepted science techniques such as contact tracing, saying that because we have so many cases in the United States, contact tracing would be useless.
““Now, there are 7 million registered cases in the US but even the CDC says that it’s probably tenfold that, that’s 70 million people at least; if we look at the world’s cases, maybe 40 million cases but we know that it’s probably 10 to 20 times that,” Atlas claimed. “So it’s not possible to do things like contact tracing and isolating asymptomatic people.”
In a rambling comment, Atlas tried to claim he never supported the debunked theory of herd immunity in dealing with the virus (which is a lie) and that the White House never considered it an option. Atlas failed to note that pursuing “population immunity,” as he rebranded it, would cost millions of American lives or that herd immunity is generally achieved through immunizations, not community spread.
“No. It’s a repeated distortion, lie, or whatever you want to call it… What they mean by ‘herd immunity strategy’ is survival of the fittest, let the infection spread through the community and develop a population immunity,” Atlas stated. “That’s never been the policy that I have advised. It’s never even been discussed inside the White House, not even for a single minute. And that’s never been the policy of the President of the United States or anybody else here. I’ve said that many many times… and yet it persists like so many other things, hence the term that the President is fond of using called fake news.”
In fact, Trump has touted herd immunity–which he mistakenly called “herd mentality”–during a September town hall in Pennsylvania. He has also repeatedly referred to it during his campaign rallies, including last night in Erie, Pennsylvania.
“Population immunity is a biological phenomenon that occurs. It’s sort of like if you’re building something in your basement: it’s down on the ground because gravity puts it there. It’s not a ‘strategy’ to say that herd immunity exists — it is obtained when a certain percentage of the population becomes resistant or immune to an infection, whether that is by getting infected or getting a vaccine or by a combination of both,” Atlas claimed. “In fact, if you don’t that believe herd immunity exists as a way to block the pathways to the vulnerable in an infection, then you would never advocate or believe in giving widespread vaccination — that’s the whole point of it… I’ve explained it to people who seemingly didn’t understand it; I’ve mentioned this radioactive word called herd immunity. But that’s not a strategy that anyone is pursuing.”