In fall 2020, a Trump administration appointee to the Department of Health and Human Servics (HHS) attempted to prevent Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, from speaking to media about the risks coronavirus poses to children.
Paul Alexander, a senior advisor to HHS’s assistant secretary for public affairs, emailed agency staff and press officers that Dr. Fauci should minimize or avoid discussion of the risks Covid poses to children and the need for children to wear masks. Alexander claimed, falsely, that “There is no data, none, zero, across the entire world, that shows children especially young children, spread this virus to other children, or to adults or to their teachers.”
When asked, Dr. Fauci said that he had not seen or heard from staff about the emails. “No one tells me what I can say and cannot say,” Fauci said. “I speak on scientific evidence.”