The Effects of Publicly Sparring With Scientists in a Pandemic

President Trump, left, has publicly feuded with and disparaged the United States’ Federal Government’s top public health scientist Dr. Anthony Fauci, right, throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Source.

The United States has been one of the hardest hit nations by the COVID-19 pandemic. As of the writing of this article, there have been over 9 million total cases and over 220,000 deaths in the nation since March. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, President Donald Trump has publicly sparred with Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a lead member of the White House Coronavirus task force. In a recent campaign call, Trump called Dr. Fauci and other public health officials “idiots,” and claimed that Fauci was a “disaster.” He also said that “if he listened to him, we’d have 700,000 [or] 800,000 deaths.” Currently, there have been over 220K deaths in the United States as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. President Trump has also famously refused to wear a mask in public, even after recovering from his own bout with COVID-19, despite masks being recommended by public health officials. 

In response to President Trump’s claims, Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, the chairman of the Senate health committee, publicly backed Dr. Fauci, stating that there would be fewer cases if Americas heeded his advice. This statement suggests that even Republicans aside from Trump tend to trust Dr. Fauci and his reputation of serving the country for decades.

In contrast to Donald Trump, Dr. Anthony Fauci has a more favorable view from most Americans, although this public image has a partisan split. 79% of Democrats think Dr. Fauci has done a good or excellent job at handling the pandemic, while just 56% of independents and 54% of Republicans have said the same thing. According to another source, 57.6% of Americans disapprove of President Trump’s handling of the coronavirus, while only 39.4% approve. There is also a partisan split; in this set of data, 82.9% of Republicans approve, but only 34.2% of independents and 6.3% of Democrats approve. Moreover, 58% of Americans distrust Donald Trump’s claims regarding the pandemic, and only 31% trust him. 51% of adults trust Dr Fauci and 55% trust the CDC, while 29% and 32% distrust Dr. Fauci and the CDC, respectively. 

In general, the American public seems to trust and approve of Dr. Fauci a great deal more than President Trump. This phenomenon can probably be attributed to Dr. Fauci’s more realistic response and predictions about the virus. He recently warned that the US was moving in the wrong direction, as cases begin to surge again across the nation. He also mentioned that a vaccine was unlikely to be distributed before January of 2021. In contrast, Donald Trump has an optimistic approach, saying that the US has made “tremendous progress” toward defeating virus in a tweet. 

However, if the President wants Americans to gain confidence in his COVID response, it would be wise of him to work directly with Dr. Fauci and the CDC, not against them. In general, the American public trusts these apolitical, bureaucratic institutions a great deal more than the White House. If the US wants to work toward reducing the cases and deaths due to the pandemic, it would be beneficial if the institutions could work together, instead of fighting each other.