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| Scott Atlas often speaks alongside Donald Trump at White House pandemic briefings.(Photo by=AP) |
[Asia News Communication = Reporter Reakkana] Two senior US public health experts raised concerns that White House adviser Scott Atlas is providing misleading or wrong information on the COVID-19 pandemic to President Donald Trump, according to media reports on Monday (Sep 28).
The top US infectious diseases expert, Anthony Fauci, told CNN on Monday he was concerned that information given by Atlas – a late addition to the White House coronavirus task force – was "really taken either out of context or actually incorrect". The comments from Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, came hours after a news report quoted Robert Redfield, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, sharing similar concerns.
Atlas, a neuroradiologist with no background in infectious diseases, has faced scrutiny for downplaying the importance of face masks and his reported views on "herd immunity", an approach that holds that once enough individuals have been infected and become immune, others are less likely to be infected.The White House insists it is not pursuing such a strategy, although Trump has mentioned it himself, and repeated on Monday his view that the United States was "rounding the corner" on the pandemic. Atlas' views on handling the pandemic have been denounced by his peers at Stanford University's medical school and other health experts.
