Dr. Scott Atlas, senior fellow at Stanford University Hoover Institution and an outspoken critic of coronavirus lockdowns, has joined the White House staff as an adviser to President Trump.
A White House spokesperson confirmed to the Washington Examiner on Monday that Atlas is now an adviser to the president but did not further explain what his responsibilities will be. Trump introduced Atlas at his press briefing the same day, saying only that he is “a very famous man” and that “he's working with us and will be working with us on the coronavirus.”
Atlas has decried statewide lockdown measures for months, writing in April that lockdowns and isolation have cost the lives of people too afraid to seek critical medical care not related to COVID-19. Isolation, he added, is also a detriment to building immunity to diseases.
“In the absence of immunization, society needs circulation of the virus, assuming high-risk people can be isolated,” he wrote in April. “It is very possible that whole-population isolation prevented natural herd immunity from developing.”
Atlas has also pushed for complete school reopenings in the fall. He said last month that the seasonal flu kills more children than the coronavirus has so far but neglected to mention that children can be very effective carriers of the virus, putting older teachers and staff at risk.
“If steps need to be taken to protect children from COVID-19, then those same steps are required each and every year that the influenza season arrives,” he wrote. “A disease … that is frequently transmitted from children to the same high-risk teachers and family members who then die, to the tune of 35,000 to 90,000 Americans every flu season .”
Trump said Monday that Atlas “has many great ideas, and he thinks what we've done is really good, and that will take it to a new level.” However, it remains unclear what kind of role Atlas will play in Trump’s moves to reopen schools next month, especially as infection rates across the South and Midwest continue to rise.
