During his hate-filled speech on Independence Day on the south lawn of the White House, Trump told another dangerous lie about the pandemic that's still raging out of control in the United States with new infections now at a rate of over 50,000 a day:
Trump returned to his now familiar and baseless complaint that America has a high caseload because it performs more tests. “Now we have tested almost 40m people. By so doing, we show cases, 99% of which are totally harmless. Results that no other country can show because no other country has the testing that we have, not in terms of the numbers or in terms of quality.”
Trump's FDA Commissioner, Stephen Hahn made an appearance on this Sunday's State of the Union on CNN, and was asked about Trump's statement, and true to form as we've come to expect from anyone willing to work for this corrupt administration, Hahn refused to directly contradict his boss and admit that he was lying.
No health expert that we have found can back that up. Can you?
HAHN: So, we know that cases are surging in the country. We have all seen the graphs associated with that.
And it's just too early, and I'm not going to speculate on what the causation is there. What I can tell you is, the way out of this, Dana, the way out of this for all Americans is to follow the CDC and the White House task force guidelines.
Social distance. Wear a mask if you find yourself in a situation where you can't social distance, good hand hygiene, all the things that I would tell my patients. And if you're near someone who is vulnerable, and you think you have been exposed, please take care and avoid exposing that person who is vulnerable.
BASH: Well, Dr. Hahn, I think it's really important to stick to the question about the 99 percent that the president threw out there.
I can tell you, it's not true, and I'm -- that's obviously not my opinion. It is fact, based on the CDC estimates. Only about a third of coronavirus cases are asymptomatic. The WHO says -- the World Health Organization says about 20 percent of people diagnosed with coronavirus are sick enough to need oxygen or hospital care.
And this is really important, probably one of the most important misclaims or, frankly, lies that the president has put out there, because it really affects people's health. If they hear the president saying, 99 percent of people are fine, they're going to change their behavior, potentially get sick, infect other people.
How does that make you feel, as a member of his own task force?
HAHN: I totally support the CDC and the information that they're putting out with respect to this pandemic.
I think it's, again, really important, the guidelines that we have emphasized, the -- the data that we have. Again, it's a rapidly evolving situation, and we're going to have more data.
But we absolutely must take this seriously. We must institute these public health measures. We cannot back off from those. It's critically important for Americans to follow those guidelines and to protect the most vulnerable.
BASH: And, Dr. Hahn, I realize this is not easy for you. You are doing -- working really hard to try to protect Americans.
So, I just have to ask you flatly, to that end, to protect Americans, is the president wrong?
HAHN: So, I'm not going to get into who is right and who is wrong.
What I have going to say, Dana, is what I have said before, which is that it's a serious problem that we have. We have seen the surge in cases. We must do something to stem the tide. And we have this in our power to do it by following the guidance from the White House task force and the CDC.
BASH: So, you won't say whether 99 percent of coronavirus cases are -- quote -- "completely harmless" is true or false, what the president said at the White House last night?
HAHN: Dana, what I will say is that we have data in the White House task force. Those data show us that this is a serious problem. People need to take it seriously.
At this point Bash finally gave up and just moved on to the next topic.
How pathetic is it that every single member of the Trump administration would rather risk the health of the public, even when it's supposed to be their job to protect it as in Hahn's case, rather than piss off the boss by daring to contradict any of the constant barrage of lies he tells day in and day out?
