President-elect Joe Biden’s Covid advisory board member Dr. Celine Gounder told CNBC that she is “relieved” upon hearing news that President Donald Trump’s special advisor on the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Scott Atlas, formally resigned from his post.
“I am relieved that in the future that people who are qualified, people who are infectious disease specialists and epidemiologists like me will be helping to lead this effort, people who are experts in this,” Gounder said in a Monday evening interview on “The News with Shepard Smith.” “You wouldn’t go to a podiatrist for a heart attack, and that was essentially what was happening.”
Atlas specializes in neuroradiology and has no background in infectious diseases. After he repeatedly pushed to reopen schools and questioned the efficacy of masks, dozens of Stanford Medical researchers and doctors called out their former colleague. They alleged that Atlas was spreading “falsehoods and misrepresentation of science.”
