Senator Rand Paul Rebukes Dr. Anthony Fauci, Says He Doesn’t Get ‘To Make A Decision'

The United States’ foremost coronavirus public health expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci has, time and again, stressed the need to extend the lockdown seeing that the nation has the highest number of COVID-19 cases. According to him, to flatten the curve of the pandemic, the social distancing measures need to be continued, which also not sending children to school in the fall, something that Senator Rand Paul is strongly against.

During a Senate committee hearing on May 12, Paul with Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, over sending kids back to school and reopening the economy. According to him, it was "ridiculous" to have a national strategy that mandates that kids will not be sent back to school in the fall.

He highlighted the observations worldwide that the COVID-19 mortality rate of children is much lower than adults. Giving the example of Sweden, where schools have been kept open for children under 16, he further stressed that schools should be reopened. "If we keep kids out of school for another year, what's going to happen is the poor and underprivileged kids who don't have a parent that's able to teach them at home are not going to learn for a full year," Paul said.

"I don't think you're the end-all. I don't think you're the one person who gets to make a decision. We can listen to your advice, but there are people on the other side saying there's not going to be a surge and that we can safely open the economy,” he added, targeting Fauci.

Fauci let the angry rebuttal slide and instead addressed Paul's comments, that he is in, no capacity, the "only voice of this" pandemic and when it comes to giving advice, it has never been for "anything other than public health."

He agreed that while children certainly have lower mortality rates than adults and the elderly, severe cases of COVID-19 have been found in kids as well. "I think we better be careful if we are not cavalier in thinking that children are completely immune to the deleterious effects" of COVID-19.

"I am very careful, and hopefully humble, in knowing that I don't know everything about this disease," Fauci said. "And that's why I'm very reserved in making broad predictions."