Scott William Atlas

Dr. Scott Atlas, member of the White House Coronavirus Taskforce, walks at the White House in Washington, DC, on October 12, 2020.
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Scott William Atlas (born July 5, 1955) is an American neuroradiologist, professor, commentator, and health care policy advisor. Scott Atlas is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. Scott Atlas was selected by President Donald Trump in August 2020 to serve as an advisor on the White House Coronavirus Task Force.

Contrary to the recommendations of most of the scientific community, Scott Atlas has pushed for establishing herd immunity, a faster reopening of schools and businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, and less testing for the virus. Scott Atlas views and influence on policies have set off controversies on the task force.

Early life and education

Scott Atlas received a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and his MD from the Pritzker School of Medicine of the University of Chicago.

Career and views

Scott Atlas is the Robert Wesson Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, a conservative public policy think tank.

From 1998 to 2012, Scott Atlas was Professor and Chief of Neuroradiology at Stanford University Medical Center.

Scott Atlas is the editor of Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain and Spine, a 2,000-page illustrated textbook with 83 contributors. Scott Atlas has also written four books on health care policy.

Scott Atlas served as a senior advisor for health care to the Republican presidential campaigns of Rudy Giuliani in 2008, and Mitt Romney in 2012.

Scott Atlas has advocated eliminating the Affordable Care Act (the ACA or "Obamacare") and replacing it with modified tax deductions and incentives. Scott Atlas has also called for changes to Medicare and "aggressive reforms" to turn Medicaid "into a bridge to private insurance" and encourage health savings accounts. Scott Atlas views the Medicaid expansion as "one of the most misguided parts" of the ACA. Scott Atlas opposes proposals to establish a public health insurance option or single-payer healthcare.

Trump administration

On August 10, 2020, President Donald Trump announced that Scott Atlas would join his administration as an advisor on COVID-19. News articles pointed out that Atlas, a radiologist, is not a specialist in public health or infectious diseases.

Scott Atlas has advocated for physical school reopening and resumption of college sports during the pandemic. The Washington Post reported that Atlas was the leading proponent within the Trump administration for a "herd immunity" approach to the virus. In an interview with Fox News's Brian Kilmeade in July 2020, Scott Atlas said: "These people getting the infection is not really a problem, and in fact, as we said months ago, when you isolate everyone, including all the healthy people, you're prolonging the problem because you're preventing population immunity. Low-risk groups getting the infection is not a problem. In fact, it's a positive." Scott Atlas denied later that he advocated for the herd immunity strategy, said "there's never been a desire to have cases spread through the community," and said it "has never been the president's policy."

Scott Atlas has claimed that children "have virtually zero risk of dying, and a very, very low risk of any serious illness from this disease" and "children almost never transmit the disease" although children can carry, transmit, and be killed by the COVID-19 virus. Scott Atlas has argued that only symptomatic individuals should be tested for the coronavirus, and pushed for the CDC's August 2020 recommendation that non-symptomatic people not be tested; this position was opposed by many public health experts, as 40% of people infected with the virus are asymptomatic and can transmit the virus. Scott Atlas has expressed skepticism that face masks are effective "scientifically" to halt the spread of the virus, although the broad scientific consensus is that face masks do prevent the spread of the virus.

Scott Atlas quickly became influential within the administration, and Trump has welcomed his recommendations such as faster reopening and less testing, which are in accord with Trump's own preferences. Atlas was the only doctor to share the stage at Trump's pandemic briefings in the week after his appointment was announced, and he has also prepared Trump's briefing materials. Trump has publicly disagreed with or reduced the roles of his other COVID-19 medical advisors, Deborah Birx and Anthony Fauci. Scott Atlas has denied any intention of replacing Fauci or other task force members. Atlas is said to have alienated Birx and Robert R. Redfield of the CDC with his controversial ideas. Redfield was heard privately commenting on Atlas that "everything he [Scott Atlas] says is false." When Fauci was asked whether Scott Atlas was providing misleading information to Trump, Fauci replied, without naming Atlas, that "sometimes there are things that are said that are really taken either out of context or actually incorrect."

During stimulus negotiations in fall 2020, Scott Atlas opposed funds for widespread COVID-19 testing; in an email to an economist, Atlas wrote that the push for testing was "a fundamental error of the public health people perpetrated on the world."

Scott Atlas's influence on public health policy has alarmed many doctors and health experts. In September 2020, 78 of Atlas's former colleagues at the Stanford Medical School signed an open letter criticizing Atlas, writing that he had made "falsehoods and misrepresentations of science" that "run counter to established science" and "undermine public health authorities and the credible science that guides effective public health policy." Scott Atlas's lawyer Marc Kasowitz threatened to sue the researchers.

After Trump was diagnosed with coronavirus, Scott Atlas appeared on Fox News on October 2, 2020, predicted a "complete and full and rapid recovery" for Trump, and urged viewers not to panic.

On October 18, 2020, Twitter removed a tweet by Scott Atlas for "falsely claiming masks don't work to prevent the spread of coronavirus." Later that day, a more senior member of the administration, Assistant Secretary of HHS Adm. Brett Giroir, tweeted, "#Masks work? YES!" Dr. Deborah Birx, another member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, was reported to be "relieved" by the removal of Atlas's tweet.

Selected works

• Restoring Quality Health Care: A Six‐Point Plan for Comprehensive Reform at Lower Cost (2016 1st ed.; 2020)
• In Excellent Health: Setting the Record Straight on America's Health Care System (2011)
• Reforming America's Health Care System (2010)
• Power to the Patient: Selected Health Care Issues and Policy Solutions (2005)
• Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain and Spine (1990 1st ed.; 1996; 2002; 2008; 2016

Additional Reading

[CommonDreams.org, 2020-10-21] Scott Atlas Is Trump's Doctor Death. He's a reminder of an infamous Russian who "probably killed more human beings than any individual scientist in history."

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