Recently, the Trump administration has been trying to discredit Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health, who has helped spearhead the effort to get the federal government to abide by the science at hand while developing its response to the Coronavirus. After administration officials privately leaked a document to reporters outlining occasions on which Fauci had supposedly been wrong, longtime Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro came out with an op-ed directly disparaging Fauci. During a web broadcast event on Tuesday, Fauci indirectly responded to some of the criticism and told the public that they can trust public health professionals like him.
The web event was hosted by the Georgetown Institute of Politics and Public Service, and a host asked Fauci how concerned members of the public can “know who to trust.” Fauci responded:
‘It’s difficult to give you a definitive answer, but for the most part, I believe, for the most part, you can trust respected medical authorities. I believe I’m one of them, so I think you can trust me. I would stick with respected medical authorities who have a track record of telling the truth, who have a track record of giving information and policy and recommendations based on scientific evidence and good data. So if I were to give advice to you and your family and your friends and your family, I would say that’s the safest bet to do, to listen to the recommendations from that category of people.’
Watch his comments below:
"I believe, for the most part, you can trust respected medical authorities," Dr. Anthony Fauci says. "I believe I'm one of them, so I think you can trust me."
His comments come as the White House has sought to undermine Fauci and criticized the CDC. https://t.co/jS8uIHaeL9 pic.twitter.com/sH01tXTtrB
— ABC News (@ABC) July 14, 2020
It’s worth noting — the public does seem to trust Fauci. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll revealed that a full 67 percent of respondents trusted him for Coronavirus-related information.
“Trump is also galled by Fauci’s approval ratings. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed that 67 percent of voters trusted Fauci for information on the coronavirus, compared with 26 percent who trusted Trump.” https://t.co/aL9UG19yYd
— Nicolle Wallace (@NicolleDWallace) July 13, 2020
On Tuesday, Fauci added that “it’s entirely understandable how the public can get mixed messages and then get a bit confused about what they should do.” After all — although he didn’t mention the incident — once, President Trump himself stood before the nation and suggested that injecting household disinfectants might be worth pursuing as a treatment option against the Coronavirus. Injecting household disinfectants would be, quite simply, toxic and potentially deadly, and eventually, Trump claimed he’d been joking — but at the time, he definitely did not seem to be joking, and the comments were the latest in a long list of reality-disconnected, pandemic-related proclamations from the president.
