The White House coronavirus coordinator continues to lose support among the medical community, according to a new report in The Washington Post.
The report noted Dr. Deborah Birx has also been undermined by Trump, who attacked her on Twitter.
"Birx — who built a career leading public health efforts against HIV/AIDS — quickly garnered Trump’s favor earlier this year for publicly championing the administration’s coronavirus response, becoming a prominent figure both inside and outside the White House," the newspaper noted. "But she soon lost support within swaths of the scientific and medical community for seeming to minimize the virus and to enable Trump’s overly rosy view of the pandemic. This past weekend, Birx lost the backing of the nation’s top Democrat, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), who privately called Birx 'the worst' and publicly said she had no confidence in her."
"Administration officials said Birx has privately argued against Trump’s push for the reopening of all schools, citing studies that show there could be outbreaks and problems," The Post reported. "In recent weeks, her time in the Oval Office has dropped, officials said, and she is not always part of decision-making meetings led by Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows."
"In a news conference Monday evening, Trump said he has 'a lot of respect' for Birx and that he thinks Pelosi has treated her 'very, very badly.' A senior Trump aide said Trump had a 'positive' meeting with Birx later Monday afternoon. Birx’s reputation has been harmed, however, in the public health community where she has spent much of her life. The turning point, several experts said, was when she began effusively praising Trump in interviews," the newspaper explained.
The newspaper interviewed Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.
“She’s ignored the evidence and gone in the media and said things that are not based in evidence at all and even the most generous understanding of what she’s said can’t be justified by the data we have,” Rasmussen said. “When you do something like that, you’re not doing your job competently and it’s really difficult to gain the respect of your colleagues when you’re all scientists and you’ve shown such willful disregard for the science.”