On Monday this week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) quietly changed its guidance to now say that asymptomatic people do not need to be tested for coronavirus, even if they have been in close contact with an infected person.
The health agency’s new guidelines limited testing to those who show symptoms. That change prompted a very loud backlash among public health experts who pointed to the role asymptomatic people play in spreading the virus and concern that the revision had been dictated a political agenda higher up in the Trump Administration.
It was later found out that the CDC referred all calls about the abrupt change in testing guidance to the Department of Health and Human Services – something that many people saw as a dead giveaway that the whole thing was politicized.
Trump told the #CDC there's too much testing – slow the testing down please. So they did. As Orwell said, Ignorance is strength. August 26, 2020
In a statement, CDC Director Robert Redfield said those who come into contact with confirmed or probable COVID-19 patients could be tested themselves, even if they do not show symptoms of the virus.
“Testing is meant to drive actions and achieve specific public health objectives. Everyone who needs a COVID-19 test, can get a test. Everyone who wants a test does not necessarily need a test; the key is to engage the needed public health community in the decision with the appropriate follow-up action,” Redfield said.
And again, the HHS department had to step in and exp;ain what Dr. Redfield was trying to say – issuing a statement saying that Redfield was “amplifying and explaining” the guidance, rather than walking back the earlier change.
According to CNBC News, Redfield said that the new guidelines were “coordinated in conjunction with the White House Coronavirus Task Force,” adding that they “received appropriate attention, consultation and input from task force experts.”
The following tweet by Dr. Redfield was `written on August 25. Pay close attention to what he says.
#DYK? You may spread #COVID19 even if you do not have symptoms. If your health department tells you that you have been exposed, do your part to #SlowtheSpread. Any info you share with the health department is confidential. Learn more about contact tracing: pic.twitter.com/nhrKNSLmkc
— Dr. Robert R. Redfield (@CDCDirector) August 25, 2020
On Wednesday, Assistant Secretary for Health Adm. Brett Giroir, who leads the Trump administration’s testing effort, defended the policy change, and denied allegations that there was any political pressure from the Trump administration.
“Let me tell you, right up front that the new guidelines are a CDC action,” he said, adding that members of the White House coronavirus task force, including Dr. Anthony Fauci and Redfield, discussed and agreed on the new guidelines.
Well, that is an out-and-out blatant lie right there, folks. Dr. Fauci told CNN’s chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, that he “was under general anesthesia in the operating room and was not part of any discussion or deliberation regarding the new testing recommendations.”
I'm an example of a (prior) COVID-positive despite having no symptoms. I tested because I was around someone w/ COVID. This allowed me to quarantine & avoid contact w/ family (some who could have been easily compromised).
This is what the #CDC now doesn't want people to do. WHY?
— Arbiter of Cool ✌ (@ArbiterofCool) August 26, 2020
I, for one, believe Dr. Fauci, especially after hearing nothing but falsehoods, fake news and conspiracy theories from the White House for nearly four years.
Added to this fiasco, the New York Times reported later on Wednesday that two federal health officials said the CDC was pressured into changing the guidance from top officials at the White House and HHS.
Bottom line in all this? Regardless of who told who to change the guidelines on coronavirus testing, the damage to an elite national health agency has been done, the same as happened with the Food and Drug Administration. It is just another example of the Trump administration putting its own agenda ahead of the safety and health of the American people.
“I think this is a black eye for the CDC. They’ve got materials on their website that really can’t be scientifically justified,” said former CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden, who is now president of Resolve to Save Lives, a global public health initiative, reports NBC News.
“The biggest Achilles’ heel of the disease is that about 40 percent of people out there who get infected with this virus are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic,” Dr. Carlos Del Rio, executive associate dean at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta. “If they’re still transmitting it and we don’t know who they are, we’re going to be in trouble.”
