Are COVID lockdowns really effective? Dr. Atlas weighs in
Dr. Scott Atlas comments on Austria imposing a nationwide coronavirus lockdown and the FDA approving booster vaccines.
EXCLUSIVE: Former Trump COVID-19 adviser Dr. Scott Atlas appeared for a voluntary interview before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis earlier this month and told Fox News that he sought to "have the facts clarified" about his role and influence on policies made by the White House's task force.
Atlas was at odds with top health officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. Deborah Birx and former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield throughout his time as Trump's COVID adviser.
"What the facts are is that I was asked by the president to help during the biggest health care crisis in a century and the reason I would, and the reason I said yes, is because the policies of Dr. Birx and Dr. Fauci were failures," Atlas told Fox News. "People were dying — including the known high-risk people, and the infection was not prevented from spreading, and meanwhile, the Birx-Fauci lockdowns and mandates and restrictions were enormously harmful, particularly on working-class families, and extremely destructive to our children."
He added: "So I said, of course, yes, as a health policy expert for the past decade and a with an extensive background in medical science and in solving complex, complicated medical issues with the appropriate policies, I said yes."
White House pandemic adviser Scott Atlas speaks to reporters during a news conference in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, Sept. 23, 2020. (REUTERS/Tom Brenner)
Atlas told Fox News that what the committee and the American public "need to understand" is that Birx was the official "who issued White House policy guidelines to the states."
"Dr. Birx as Task Force Coordinator, capitalized, wrote all the guidance to every single state for six months before I was in Washington, and after, Birx visited dozens of states and met personally with all the governors and their local public health officials. I visited only one single state when I was in Washington, and that was the state of Florida," Atlas said.
"My point is, Birx and Fauci were the most influential, visible faces of the White House, and issued federal guidance of broad restrictions, mandates, lockdowns, school closures, business closures, and those were implemented throughout almost the entire country the entire year, including before, during and after I left," Atlas said.
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But despite that timeline, Atlas said Birx is "trying to rewrite history and blame people who were opposed to what was implemented for the failure of what was implemented, which was her policy."
"My role in Washington was to advise the president when asked about any issue, and when I did, my opinions were bringing the most, as much scientific evidence and published scientific literature to the table — critiquing the data and going through like a medical scientist and critical thinker," Atlas said.
White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx listens in the Oval Office of the White House, May 6, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Atlas told Fox News he told the committee that the policies he advised of were "increases in targeted protection to stop people from dying, to safely open schools and society so that the harms of lockdowns would end."
"That was not implemented and instead, the Birx and Fauci lockdowns were implemented," Atlas said. "And those policies literally killed people and destroyed families and have a massive psychological, destructive harm on the younger generation."
Birx testified before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis in October, saying that officials in Trump's White House did not take steps to push mask-wearing, social distancing and other mitigation steps that could have prevented thousands of COVID-19 deaths.
Birx also reportedly slammed Atlas, saying he advocated for letting COVID-19 spread through the population to reach herd immunity. The New York Times reported Birx testified that she repeatedly raised her concerns about Atlas' positions and theories to other doctors on the task force.
At the time, Atlas described her testimony and accounting of the events as an "Orwellian attempt to rewrite history."
Meanwhile, Atlas told Fox News that President Biden’s campaign promise to "defeat" COVID-19 was a "scientifically and medically incorrect" promise.
"It is contrary to medical science to say something like that because you cannot defeat the virus," Atlas said. "And this reinforces the misconception that we can eradicate the virus by these various mitigation measures, and that’s not how biology works."
Atlas said that "what is known about the virus is what has been known since the summer of 2020."
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"It has been known for almost more than a year and a half now that the virus spreads regardless of these lockdown policies," Atlas said.
Atlas said that "shamefully" this is "being continually propagated by the leading faces of public health in our country."
"So, it wasn’t smart of him to say it politically, and it was a statement that should have never been made because it is medically, scientifically not going to happen," Atlas said. "The Biden administration’s problem is they continued this sort of irrational, erratic policy of denying what we know — which is that the virus is going to spread regardless of the shutdowns."
He added: "The policy of restricting all of society and has failed and instead of just focusing on stopping the damages from the shutdowns and increasing the protection of the vulnerable, and prioritizing the high-risk people, there still remains these irrational pronouncements and denials of science."
When asked if he felt that the highly transmissible omicron variant infecting millions across the nation could lead the United States to endemic status, Atlas said it is "difficult to predict with any certainty."
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"What we know, in the natural history of viruses, a virus evolves during a pandemic," Atlas said. "They become less lethal. That's what we're seeing here with omicron, and with the preliminary evidence and early data shows that the omicron infection generates protective immunity."
He added that it is "important for people to know that we, as a society, in the United States alone, experience roughly 50,000 deaths per year from influenza, and we have accepted that without any fear or other maneuvers or social restrictions."
"So, the question is, are we going to, as a society, somehow abandon rational thinking and panic?" Atlas asked. "Doctors and scientists who know anything about pandemics expected the variants to develop, and also expected these variants and mutations to generate less lethal, less deadly forms."
He added: "So this is exactly what was anticipated by people who have knowledge."
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