White House’s Dr. Atlas: ‘Lockdown More Harmful Than Virus’

by Jefferey Jaxen, The HighWire
September 6, 2020

To those paying attention to the full breadth of scientific data, the coronavirus lockdown should be over. Any hint of repeating it for a ‘second wave’ should be off the table.

Yet many nations’ populations still wrestle with heavy-handed government responses which, rather than follow proper science, echo an authoritarian power grab unwilling to let go.

Throughout much of the White House’s Coronavirus Task Force pressers, Dr. Anthony Fauci took the mic with flip-flopping prognostications. He cherry-picked science and led to unnecessary economic hardship for far too many Americans. His recent absence from the President’s side has been filled by a more rational, science-driven Dr. Scott Atlas – a former Stanford University Medical Center professor and physician now serving as a special adviser to the President.

Although Dr. Atlas has had limited White House podium time, there appears to be a change in the air. While Dr. Fauci’s views attempt to remain relevant through milquetoast public relations-like media appearances, Dr. Atlas has wasted little time making the real science known. Identified as a needed voice of wisdom and reason on the Coronavirus Taskforce, Dr. Atlas recently appeared at the Steamboat Institute’s Freedom Conference to lay out some hard truths.

Regarding the coronavirus lockdown response, Dr. Atlas admitted the lockdown response was more harmful than the virus, suggesting “history will record as a failure of policy.” These are not just his feelings. Several key metrics have and continue to sound alarm bells.

Depression, mental health challenges, and suicidal ideations have all seen an uptick under the strains of the lockdown. The negative economic impact will continue to take ‘life years’ away from untold segments of the population. The blanket closure of all hospitals and the canceling of non-essential procedures was also a mistake. The Colorado Sun, covering a recent study done by researchers from Denver Health, reported

“At Denver Health and other large hospitals across the metro area, the number of people showing up with cardiac emergencies dropped significantly as the state imposed increasingly strict measures encouraging people to stay at home to slow the virus’ spread. And this was not unique to Colorado — hospitals across the country and in Europe documented the same phenomenon.“

The study found that the number of people in Denver who died of cardiac arrest at home in the two weeks following the statewide stay-at-home order was greater than the total number of people who died of COVID-19 in the city during that time.

Dr. Atlas didn’t stop at blasting the needlessly overreaching lockdowns. Speaking on the efforts to discredit hydroxychloroquine, he claimed: “objective science is nearly dead.” Dr. Atlas went further, citing “many papers that were published that were literally garbage” and some so bad “they were fraudulent.”

The idea that scientific journals can and are agenda-driven is not a novel idea. In 2009, former editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine (the first woman to do so) Marcia Angell wrote, “It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published.” Widely reported in 2015, Richard Smith, who edited the British Medical Journal for more than a decade, said there was no evidence that peer review was a good method of detecting errors and claimed that “most of what is published in journals is just plain wrong or nonsense.” Smith went further to say, “If peer review was a drug, it would never get on the market because we have lots of evidence of its adverse effects and don’t have evidence of its benefit…It’s time to slaughter the sacred cow.”

It’s clear Atlas means business. And although you’ll never see him posing poolside in dark sunglasses for the cover of InStyle magazine like that other guy, the public is getting straight answers to vital questions.

In a new opinion piece published by The Hill titled Restore our lives using medical science, data, and common sense, Dr. Atlas lets rip on why schools should open.

While power-hungry health officials and bureaucrats attempt to squeeze the last drops of fear to justify taking more of your liberties, Dr. Atlas shoots straight writing. He writes:

“Here’s what we now know:

We know who is at risk. Only 0.2 percent of U.S. deaths have been people younger than 25, and 80 percent have been in people over 65; the average fatality age is 78. A JAMA Pediatrics study of North American pediatric hospitals flatly stated that “our data indicate that children are at far greater risk of critical illness from influenza than from COVID-19.“

Then there’s the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) data. An analysis of CDC data shows that the case fatality rate has declined by approximately 85 percent from its peak. And that’s the ‘bad’ news. A recent report by the agency states that in only 6% of cases, COVID-19 was listed as the only cause of death. While there is much debate of a misinterpretation of the data as fact-checkers and social media giants scramble to stamp out any reporting or discussion of this fact, it’s a key data point.

It was early in the coronavirus response that Minnesota senator Dr. Scott Jensen went public with an unusual request he received by the CDC to count deaths as Covid, even if they couldn’t be proven or verified. He also showed a major financial incentive for hospitals listing Covid deaths compared to non-Covid deaths. The CDC’s directives forever skewed the true accounting of Covid cases.

The CDC also made headlines after a unanimous decision was made by doctors on the task force to leverage the massive U.S. testing apparatus to a more targeted strategy. The shift made testing necessary only for healthcare workers and those in nursing homes or long-term care facilities.

During a press conference in Florida alongside Gov. Ron DeSantis, Dr. Atlas commented that finding positive, asymptomatic tests “wasn’t the purpose of testing.” The purpose of testing is to protect high-risk individuals and to “stop [those] people from dying…stop people from getting a serious illness”, said Atlas.

It appears that a truer semblance of ‘science’ is running the country’s coronavirus policy. But the question remains about if/when a full recovery from the previously unnecessary lockdown measures will occur. Dr. Fauci is now relegated to sit with his rightful faction among the Gates–WHO–Corporate Media complex. Will his influence and the influence of those he aligns with take a back seat while America recovers?

https://thehighwire.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/AtlasHWClip-1.mp4