2:53
- ABC News
- Donald Trump
- August 6, 2020
Trump finds a foil in science: ANALYSIS
Trump says the coronavirus is "going away." Scientists warn it's not.
2:53
The president dialed it back by Monday evening, saying in a press conference he has \"a lot of respect\" for Birx but would not answer a follow-up question on whether his characterization of the virus aligned with that of the task force doctor.
The Washington Post reported on the same day that the amount of time Birx spends in the Oval Office has decreased in recents weeks.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/birx-01-as-ap-200721_1595352806440_hpEmbed_3x2_384.jpg\")
Before Trump reversed on Birx, he and White House aides appeared to undermine Fauci, with Trump even retweeting on multiple occasions the hashtag \"Fire Fauci.\"
Trump has openly and repeatedly said he disagrees with the doctor's blunt assessments of the country's testing capability and outlook of the spread since March. In July, Trump started saying Fauci \"made a lot of mistakes,\" falsely blaming him for the government's reversal on masks.
One top Trump aide even published an op-ed in USA Today trashing the nation's top expert on infectious diseases as never having been right on anything since they met.
The consequences to sidelining science
Dr. Sara Tariq, a professor of medicine and associate dean at the University of Arkansas Medical School, told ABC News that she's concerned science is being sidelined at a critical time.
\"I'm very concerned that our nation is sidelining data and reasoning and science and statistics in light of the sort of individualistic approach to how we as Americans deal with adversity,\" Tariq said. \"Our sense of self-liberty is very strong, but I worry that it's those same things that make us amazing -- our liberty, our individualism, our freedom -- in this situation, are really harming us.\"
Fauci told FiveThirtyEight last month the country's hyper-partisan environment has made it more difficult to suppress the virus: \"I think you'd have to admit that that's the case.\"
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/fauci-trump-03-as-gty-200710_hpEmbed_3x2_384.jpg\")
\"You have to be having blindfolders on and covering your ears to think that we don't live in a very divisive society now, from a political standpoint,\" he said. \"You'd have to make the assumption that if there wasn't such divisiveness, that we would have a more coordinated approach.\"
Task force doctors like Fauci and Birx have largely resorted to cable news interviews and expert panels to provide updates directly to the public for the past two months, as opposed to flanking the president at briefings.
Dr. Schluger argues there's also a responsibility that falls on scientists to learn how better to disseminate information to the public themselves and not rely on government agencies or media, intertwined in politics, to relay the facts accurately.
\"The scientific community is going to have to figure out how -- how to communicate better with the general public and how to convince people that, frankly, there is such a thing as expertise,\" he said.
ABC News' Arielle Mitropoulos contributed to this report.
Tune into ABC at 1 p.m. ET and ABC News Live at 4 p.m. ET every weekday for special coverage of the novel coronavirus with the full ABC News team, including the latest news, context and analysis.
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