Good public health policy takes the totality of circumstances into account.
Unprecedented, because pandemic preparation experts had never before recommended shutting down an entire country, Atlas says. Meanwhile, the lockdowns rationalized by this “science” were setting the stage for an unprecedented public health catastrophe. Natural immunity was no doubt a threat to lockdown mandates because it would have inspired confidence in millions of COVID-19 survivors – and alleviated the fear that sustained them. To make matters worse, even as the disease spread, there was no acknowledgement of the role of natural immunity from the virus, something that would have given people hope. Overall, for those without an underlying condition, the risk of death is small, regardless of age, Atlas says. The vast majority of people who contracted the virus were either asymptomatic or had relatively mild symptoms. It soon became clear that the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions bore the brunt of the virus, while children were overwhelmingly spared. Blurring the distinction between such people and the generally healthy population created the impression that the virus was much more threatening to the general public than it really was.Īt the same time, public health officials and the media misled the public about relative risk. As he pointed out in a recent interview with Tucker Carlson, it turns out that two-thirds of COVID-19 deaths occurred in individuals with six or more co-morbidities. Reports of actual deaths were also misleading because they failed to distinguish patients who died with COVID-19 from patients who died from COVID-19. He saw early on that the fatality rates, based on faulty data, were exaggerated. They were driven by a media campaign of fear that overstated the bad news and refused to acknowledge the good. It is no wonder that the lockdowns themselves were creating panic and anxiety.īut there was no “science” to support these lockdowns, Atlas realized at their outset. The governors, acting under public health emergency powers, imposed broad societal lockdowns, in what then Attorney General Bill Barr called “the greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history.” The lives of millions of citizens were disrupted and suspended as businesses, schools, and houses of worship were all shuttered indefinitely. Together they dictated the devastating lockdown policies forced on the American citizens they would intimidate into compliance.īirx was in charge of carrying the Task Force’s advice to the states, where it was almost always followed, Atlas explains. Robert Redfield, then Director of the CDC. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and Dr. The Task Force, chaired by Vice President Mike Pence, was led by career bureaucrats: Dr. That grim message came directly from the Task Force and was eagerly broadcast by a hostile press hell-bent on destroying the President’s chances for a second term.
Just two weeks, and we’ll be looking at this thing in the rear-view mirror.īut before long, those early assurances gave way to dire warnings from our public health officials: “Stop the virus at all costs,” or millions will die. My father was a doctor who understood that fear kills.Īt first, we were assured they would be temporary. “When we tell a patient they have six months or three months to live,” he once explained to a reporter, “we make them die faster.” And, he would also say, we rob them of the life they do have left. And, although other doctors would disagree, he would not tell his patients how long they should expect to survive, even if he had “the science” to predict it. He would find a way to gently level with them without demoralizing them. Above all, he was scrupulous not to frighten his patients, especially those who were seriously ill and therefore vulnerable to despair. The answer lies as much in what he didn’t say as in what he did. So, what did he say to them that made it worth waiting for? At his funeral, one of them recounted the lengthy wait in his crowded office – worth it, she said, because in the end you were going to get to talk to him.
#Dr scott atlas how to#
My father knew how to speak to his patients, and they loved him for it. That principle guided my father, who was both a pioneer in heart-transplant surgery and a small-town doctor, throughout his medical career.
A doctor’s words can do as much to heal – or harm – as the treatment he prescribes.
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