September 23, 2020

Dr. Fauci Pushes Back on Rand Paul’s Pseudoscience

Jennings Graeme/Abaca/Zuma

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Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) suggested at Wednesday’s Senate hearing on the federal pandemic response that shutdowns did not curb the spread of the coronavirus. Dr. Anthony Fauci wasn’t having it.

“You’ve lauded New York for their policy,” Paul said during the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions subcommittee hearing. “New York had the highest death rate in the world. How can we possibly be jumping up and down and saying, ‘Oh, Governor Cuomo did a great job’?”

“No, you misconstrued that, senator, and you’ve done that repetitively in the past,” Fauci replied. “They got hit very badly, they made some mistakes. Right now, if you look at what’s going on right now, the things that are going on in New York, to get their test positivity to 1 percent or less, is because they are looking at the guidelines that we have put together from the task force of the four or five things, or masks, social distancing, outdoors more than indoors, avoiding crowds, and washing hands.”

“Or they have developed enough community immunity that they’re no longer having the pandemic because they have enough immunity in New York City to actually stop it,” Paul interjected.

“This happens with Senator Rand all the time,” Fauci said. “You were not listening to what the director of the CDC said, that in New York it’s about 22 percent. If you believe that 22 percent is herd immunity, I believe you’re alone in that.”

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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