Dr. Scott Atlas resigned from the White House coronavirus task force on Monday after months of advocating against social distancing policies and disputing the medical consensus around COVID-19. A frequent Fox News guest, Atlas was reportedly a deeply controversial presence even among some other members of the pandemic team.
They may have been breathing private sighs of relief on Monday, but Atlas former colleagues at Stanford University went public with their celebration.
Dr. Scott Atlas resignation today is long overdue and underscores the triumph of science and truth over falsehoods and misinformation, dozens of Stanford faculty, including top infectious disease experts, said in a public statement.
His actions have undermined and threatened public health even as countless lives have been lost to COVID-19. We will continue to advocate for evidence-based public health policies that are grounded in established science, including the use of proven preventative measures like mask-wearing and social-distancing, and the safe testing and delivery of effective therapies and vaccines.
Atlas, a favorite of President Donald Trump who falsely claimed that masks do not work, became synonymous with Trumps neglectful response to the pandemic after the president named him to the coronavirus task force in August. As COVID-19 cases and deaths surged in the United States, Atlas advocated for a less restrictive government response an approach that appealed to the desire of Trump and other Republicans to downplay the virus and lift lockdown measures.
Like many Trump picks, Atlas caught the presidents attention with his numerous hard-charging spots on conservative media. During his Fox News appearances in the early months of the pandemic, he pushed a consistent message that the government should ignore public health experts in favor of policies that usually required doing less and reopening more. In a typical appearance on Tucker Carlson s show in early May, Atlas claimed that it was far too late in the pandemic to create contact tracing programs similar to those being used in multiple other countries.
Its simply illogical and impossible to do contact tracing. Theres no reason to have contact tracing as a predicate for reopening, Atlas said.
He denied any need for widespread testing, stating on May 7 that only certain groups such as health care workers required screening for COVID-19. On Fox News host Brian Kilmeades radio show, Atlas disputed scientific studies that supported the wearing of masks and stated in recent months that the data is unclear on masks. He repeatedly flirted with the idea of pursuing herd immunity letting the coronavirus spread until enough of the population became infected and developed resistance to the virus although he has denied advocating such a policy.