Dr. Anthony Fauci was undergoing surgery when the White House Coronavirus Task Force convened without him to discuss controversial new testing guidelines, CNN reported Wednesday.
Dr. Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, told CNN’s chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta he was incapacitated when the task force met last week before the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention quietly changed its guidance concerning who should be tested for COVID-19, the disease the novel coronavirus causes, CNN reported.
The CDC previously recommended COVID-19 testing for anyone recently in contact with a person infected with the contagious disease regardless of whether they show any symptoms, but that guidance was revised Monday to say that people without symptoms “do not necessarily need a test” unless they are vulnerable or it is advised by their health care provider.
“I was under general anesthesia in the operating room last Thursday. Was not part of any discussion or deliberation regarding these new testing recommendations,” said Dr. Fauci, according to a message Mr. Gupta read on the air Wednesday evening. “I’m concerned about the interpretation of these recommendations. I’m worried it will give people the incorrect assumption that asymptomatic spread is not of great concern. In fact, it is.”
President Trump’s administration defended the revision after it began to attract scrutiny this week, and on Wednesday a top heath official said Dr. Fauci had signed off on it.
“I don’t want to talk about internal deliberations,” said Admiral Brett Giroir, assistant secretary of health and human services and the Trump administration’s testing tsar, State News reported Wednesday. “But yes, all the docs signed off on this before it even got to the task force level.”
CNN previously reported that Dr. Fauci, 79, underwent surgery last Thursday to remove a polyp on his vocal cord.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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