The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), Dr Anthony Fauci, pushed back against Senator Rand Paul's views on the coronavirus pandemic. During a Wednesday hearing, the top infectious disease expert told the politician that he misinterpreted the facts about the virus and had done so before many times.
Heated arguments
The hearing was preceded by the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and had Paul question Fauci if the medical expert had any changes to his coronavirus mitigation recommendations.
The Republican senator also made several claims about herd immunity and other international efforts against the COVID-19 virus. However, Fauci refused to comment on the questions during the hearing.
According to USA Today, the infectious disease expert responded by saying he would explain about the matters in detail at a later time. Fauci also noted it was wrong to compare the United States with Sweden as there are a lot of factors that make the two countries different.
The Johns Hopkins University coronavirus tracker said that the United States currently has a fatality of 2.9 percent. Sweden, on the other hand, has about 6.6 percent. Several conservatives who previously criticized the virus mitigation efforts that included national lockdown hailed the Nordic country's responses despite the higher death rates due to the pandemic.
The NIAID director said that the recommendations he and his colleagues have given were based on the available data at the time. Fauci noted that they would make revisions to the guidelines as new information is recorded.
During the Wednesday hearing, the infectious disease expert said he did not regret any of the recommendations they made during the initial stages of the pandemic. Fauci added that they believed the best way to stop the explosion of infections was to virtually shut down the nation and prevent people from gathering in large crowds or going outside too frequently.
Coronavirus misunderstandings
Senator Paul has spent a lot of time trying to discredit Fauci, and the questions during the hearing were the latest incident. The NIAID director criticized the politician for his view of herd immunity in New York, as reported by CNN.
The medical experts noted that about 60 to 80 percent of a population is required to be vaccinated or have developed antibodies for herd immunity to be considered achieved.
According to NBC Washington, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr Robert Redfield, warned earlier in the hearing that over 90 percent of the country's population was still vulnerable to the coronavirus pandemic.
Fauci pushed back against Senator Paul and stated the politician was not listening to the CDC director. The medical expert also criticized the Kentucky official that if he believes 22 percent was herd immunity, he was alone in that belief.
The NIAID director said that New York was able to achieve one percent or less test positivity because they began to follow the recommendations given by health experts. Fauci noted the city initially made mistakes and suffered high death rates because of them.
The two officials had previously argued in May when Senator Paul expressed his disbelief that Fauci was worthy of his top infectious disease expert title.
