Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has become alarmed at the influence that new coronavirus adviser Scott Atlas has over President Trump.
“Everything he says is false,” Redfield said during a phone call made in public on a commercial flight and overheard by NBC News.
Redfield confirmed after the flight that he was speaking about Dr. Atlas, a neuroradiologist from Stanford University who joined the White House coronavirus task force in August. He was brought on as an adviser to the president after a series of media appearances throughout the summer in which he denounced states’ efforts to quell the outbreak by shuttering businesses and schools.
In response to Redfield’s comments, Atlas said in a statement, “Everything I have said is directly from the data and the science. It echoes what is said by many of the top medical scientists in the world, including those at Stanford, Harvard, and Oxford.”
Redfield is among several infectious disease experts on the task force who have warned that a protracted public health emergency could require some businesses, such as bars and restaurants, to remain partially closed until a vaccine is approved.
After Redfield warned last week that 90% of the population remains susceptible to COVID-19, Atlas told reporters hours later that Redfield “misstated something there,” adding that people also may have other forms of immunity to the virus.
When pressed about why people should listen to him over public health officials, Atlas said, “You’re supposed to believe the science, and I’m telling you the science.”
He has also accused coronavirus advisers of fearmongering and withholding “all the knowledge that we have.”
“The data is out there, and we don’t all have to be paralyzed with fear,” Atlas said Thursday on Fox News. “We have to do very, very diligent protection of the people who are vulnerable, and those are usually older people with other comorbidities, and we need to open because we know the harms of not opening.”
A White House official told NBC News that the president “consults with many experts both inside and outside of the federal government who sometimes disagree with one another.”
“He then makes policy decisions based on all of the information to save lives and safely reopen the country,” the official said, adding that “everyone, including the president, recommends wearing a mask when you cannot social distance.”
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, and Dr. Deborah Birx, the coronavirus response coordinator, declined to comment.
