https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/16/us-...stration-shifted-control-from-cdc-to-hhs.html Coronavirus data has already disappeared after Trump administration shifted control from CDC Since the pandemic began, the CDC has regularly published data on availability of hospital beds and intensive care units across the country. But Ryan Panchadsaram, who helps run a data-tracking site called Covid Exit Strategy, said that when he tried to collect the data from the CDC on Tuesday, it had disappeared. When reached for comment Thursday by CNBC, HHS spokesman Michael Caputo said in a statement that the CDC was directed to make the data available again. Previously public data has already disappeared from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s website after the Trump administration quietly shifted control of the information to the Department of Health and Human Services. Since the pandemic began, the CDC regularly published data on availability of hospital beds and intensive care units across the country. But Ryan Panchadsaram, who helps run a data-tracking site called Covid Exit Strategy, said that when he tried to collect the data from the CDC on Tuesday, it had disappeared. “We were surprised because the modules that we normally go to were empty. The data wasn’t available and not there,” he said. “There was no warning.” CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield told reporters on a conference call Wednesday that states were told to stop sending hospital information to the National Healthcare Safety Network site, the CDC’s system for gathering data, beginning Wednesday. Instead, all data will now be reported through HHS’ reporting portal, officials said, adding that the decision was made to streamline data reporting and to provide HHS officials with real-time data. Public health specialists and former health officials acknowledged that the CDC’s data reporting infrastructure was limited, and said it needs to be overhauled to meet the demands of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, they expressed concern in interviews with CNBC that the change could lead to less transparent data. When reached for comment Thursday by CNBC, HHS spokesman Michael Caputo said in a statement that the CDC was directed to make the data available again. In the future, he said, HHS will provide “more powerful insights.” “Yes, HHS is committed to being transparent with the American public about the information it is collecting on the coronavirus,” he said. “Therefore, HHS has directed CDC to re-establish the coronavirus dashboards it withdrew from the public on Wednesday.” Representatives of the CDC did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment. Later in the day, the CDC restored the site’s previous dashboards with data through Tuesday, saying: “This file will not be updated after July 14, 2020 and includes data from April 1 to July 14.” WATCH NOW VIDEO01:12 Former FDA chief Scott Gottlieb on HHS taking over Covid-19 data collection from CDC The CDC’s web page for data on available hospital and ICU beds has added a note that reads: “Data displayed on this page was submitted directly to CDC’s National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) and does not include data submitted to other entities contracted by or within the federal government.” “We don’t have this critical indicator anymore,” Panchadsaram said. “The intent of just switching the data streams towards HHS, that’s fine. But you got to keep the data that you’re sharing publicly still available and up to date.” Panchadsaram said he and his team, which includes researchers from the Duke-Margolis Center for Health Policy and from Resolve to Save Lives, a public health initiative led by former CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden, have been tracking the data since April. Panchadsaram thinks of the project as something of a “progress bar” as they grade different states on the overall progress they’ve made in fighting Covid-19. Available hospital beds and ICU capacity is a key indicator they use to assess state performance, he added. “It’s disappointing. It happened a lot quicker than expected,” he said. “The picture that we’re presenting to the world is incomplete.” Other coronavirus researchers and public health specialists expressed concern because the policy change was announced so suddenly in the midst of a public health crisis that appears to be worsening. Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University, which runs one of the most popular third-party coronavirus data dashboards, said the policy change won’t impact the Hopkins site because they’ve managed to source their data directly from states. She added, however, that the policy change raises questions about the transparency of the data and the role of the CDC in the ongoing U.S. response. “What worries me is that we seem to be pushing rather suddenly in the midst of what feels like a very urgent time in terms of surging cases that we’re seeing across the country,” she told CNBC. “The question is, what are we going to lose in this transition, and in particular at a moment where we really don’t want to lose any ability to understand what’s happening in hospitals.” Nuzzo expressed concern that the administration didn’t appear to fully plan out how the transition in data reporting would work and didn’t give hospitals or researchers a warning about the change or how it might affect them. “I think it’s reasonable to worry that it could lead to erosion of capacities at a moment where we very much can’t afford to lose any abilities at this point,” she added. “I don’t fully understand how it’s going to work. That in and of itself is problematic.” Dr. Jen Kates, senior vice president and director of global health and HIV policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, echoed Nuzzo’s concerns about the speed with which the decision has become policy. She added that the Trump administration has politicized the public health crisis for months, so the policy change raises concerns about the integrity of the data as well. “It’s been such a critical source of information for everyone, for states, for researchers, for reporters, for the public to try to understand what’s happening,” she said. “The last thing you want is for data to be politicized. It just raises that concern. Will data being at HHS create a more politicized use of it, or maybe not. But again, it’s a concern that’s been raised.” President Donald Trump and his administration have come under fire during the pandemic from critics who say the White House is undermining the country’s public health professionals. Last week, Trump criticized the CDC’s guidelines on reopening schools as too tough and expensive, and Vice President Mike Pence said the agency would issue additional recommendations. “There’s been concerns raised about when CDC has the leeway to offer its advice as a public health agency, really based on the evidence and the data, and there’s been several examples where we’re not clear that that’s been the case,” Kates said. “I think that is a concern that many have; is there any political significance to this change?”
https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/26/health/cdc-guidelines-coronavirus-testing/index.html Updated CDC guidelines now say people exposed to coronavirus may not need to be tested (CNN)In a shift that perplexed some doctors, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has changed its Covid-19 testing guidelines to say some people without symptoms may not need to be tested, even if they've been in close contact with someone known to have the virus. Previously, the CDC said viral testing was appropriate for people with recent or suspected exposure, even if they were asymptomatic. Dr. Leana Wen, an emergency physician and public health professor at George Washington University who was previously Baltimore's health commissioner, said on CNN's New Day on Wednesday that the testing guideline changes make no sense. "These are exactly the people who should be tested," Wen said, giving the example of a person exposed at work who wants a test so they can protect their family at home. A senior federal health official close to the process tells CNN the sudden change in CDC Covid-19 testing guidance was the result of pressure from the Trump administration. When asked by CNN whether the CDC was responding to pressure from the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services, the senior official said, "It's coming from the top down." Here's what the CDC website said previously: "Testing is recommended for all close contacts of persons with SARS-CoV-2 infection. Because of the potential for asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic transmission, it is important that contacts of individuals with SARS-CoV-2 infection be quickly identified and tested." The CDC changed the site on Monday. Here's what it says now: "If you have been in close contact (within 6 feet) of a person with a COVID-19 infection for at least 15 minutes but do not have symptoms, you do not necessarily need a test unless you are a vulnerable individual or your health care provider or State or local public health officials recommend you take one." Those who don't have Covid-19 symptoms and haven't been in close contact with someone with a known infection do not need a test, the updated guidelines say. "Not everyone needs to be tested," the agency's website says. "If you do get tested, you should self-quarantine/isolate at home pending test results and follow the advice of your health care provider or a public health professional." The CDC guidelines say if someone has symptoms and they're mild, a health care provider "may advise a COVID-19 test," and if symptoms are severe, people should contact a health care provider or seek emergency care. "It is important to realize that you can be infected and spread the virus but feel well and have no symptoms," the updated CDC site says, noting that local public health officials might request asymptomatic "healthy people" be tested, depending on cases and spread in an area. In its pandemic planning scenarios, the CDC says its current best estimate is that 40% of infections are asymptomatic and 50% of transmission occur before symptoms occur. 'The guidelines baffle me,' doctor says Doctors were puzzled by the change and questioned why the CDC did not explain why it made the update. CDC referred questions to HHS. In a statement provided Wednesday to CNN, HHS Assistant Secretary Dr. Brett Giroir said: "This Guidance has been updated to reflect current evidence and best public health practices, and to further emphasize using CDC-approved prevention strategies to protect yourself, your family, and the most vulnerable of all ages." HHS has not specified what change in "current evidence" may have driven the change. The statement continued: "The updated Guidance places an emphasis on testing individuals with symptomatic illness, those with a significant exposure or for vulnerable populations, including residents and staff in nursing homes or long term care facilities, critical infrastructure workers, healthcare workers and first responders, and those individuals (who may be asymptomatic) when prioritized by public health officials." Wen, the former Baltimore health commissioner, said, "I'm concerned that these recommendations suggest someone who has had substantial exposure to a person with Covid-19 now doesn't need to get tested." "This is key to contact tracing, especially given that up to 50% of all transmission is due to people who do not have symptoms. One wonders why these guidelines were changed -- is it to justify continued deficit of testing?" Dr. Carlos del Rio, infectious disease specialist and associate dean of Emory University School of Medicine, told CNN's Jim Acosta on Wednesday that not testing may be OK in some circumstances -- brief contact, for example. "But if you have been in contact for 50 minutes and that people doesn't have a mask, I think you need to be tested regardless if you have symptoms or not," he said. "We know especially young people going into the house and then transmit inside the household. So, the guidelines baffle me and I really don't understand them." Del Rio added that he's concerned about politics influencing these decisions. He noted that President Trump has said in the past that more testing leads to the detection of more cases. "I am worried that this is just a way to slow down testing and that would clearly be not good," deo Rio said. "We don't want to decrease the amount of testing. We want to decrease cases by decreasing transmission, not by decreasing testing." A spokesperson at the US Department of Health and Human Services on Tuesday denied the change would affect contact tracing efforts, which most public health officials say is key to any eventual control of the virus. "The updated guidance does not undermine contact tracing or any other types of surveillance testing," the spokesperson said. HHS said people should consult with their doctors or with local health officials to decide if they need to be tested. "The guidance fully supports public health surveillance testing, done in a proactive way through federal, state, and local public health officials," the spokesperson said.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/08/trump-cdc-coronavirus-testing-keep-numbers-low.html Reports: Trump Sabotaged Coronavirus Testing to Keep Numbers Low Public-health officials believe that widespread testing is a key element of any response to the coronavirus. President Trump does not believe this. And now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has officially adopted Trump’s view. It has modified its official guidelines, and no longer recommends that those who have been exposed to the virus but currently lack symptoms get a test. The first reports of this change were filled with comments from incredulous experts, whose assessments included “bizarre,” “very strange,” “this is going to make things worse,” and so on. Now we have an explanation for this bizarre policy: High-level officials ordered it. CNN reports the change “came this week as a result of pressure from the upper ranks of the Trump administration.” The New York Times adds, “One official said the directive came from the top down. Another said the guidelines were not written by the C.D.C. but were forced down.” Evidence that Trump has sought to slow down testing has been available for a long time. In March, Trump told reporters he kept infected passengers offshore on a cruise ship in order to hold down the official numbers of infections: “I like the numbers being where they are. I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship.” He has said for months that the availability of testing increases recorded case levels and makes him look bad. (“When you test, you have a case. When you test, you find something is wrong with people. If we didn’t do any testing, we would have very few cases.”) And he has insisted that many people who get tests don’t need them, because they’re young and will recover. “Many of those cases are young people that would heal in a day,” he said on July 19. “They have the sniffles and we put it down as a test.” In July, Trump announced at a rally, “You know testing is a double-edged sword … Here’s the bad part: When you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people; you’re going to find more cases. So I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down please.’” His defenders insisted he was kidding. A reporter offered Trump the chance to make this defense. He did not. When asked, “But did you ask to slow [testing] down?” Trump shrugged and replied, “If it did slow down, frankly, I think we’re way ahead of ourselves, if you want to know the truth. We’ve done too good a job, because every time we go up, with 25 million tests, you’re gonna find more people, so then they say, ‘Oh, we have more cases in the United States.’” Of course this is also perfectly consistent with Trump’s oft-stated belief that the pandemic is a perception problem, and that pretending it doesn’t exist will help him politically. Reporters have repeatedly confirmed that Trump has applied this pressure behind the scenes. Dan Diamond reported in March that the White House “did not push to do aggressive additional testing in recent weeks, and that’s partly because more testing might have led to more cases being discovered of coronavirus outbreak, and the president had made clear — the lower the numbers on coronavirus, the better for the president, the better for his potential reelection this fall.” And in July, Katherine Bean reported that during internal meetings, “Trump also feared that more testing would only lead to higher case counts and more bad publicity.” There has been a weird reluctance to take Trump’s comments seriously or literally. But the accumulation of evidence is quite clear. Trump’s public comments, reports of his private position, and the reports by officials of the latest change all point to the same conclusion: Trump is overruling public-health officials and sabotaging coronavirus testing because he believes keeping the case counts misleadingly low will make him look better.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/dr-fa...-when-cdc-changed-covid-19-testing-guidelines Fauci Says He Was Under Anesthesia When CDC Changed COVID-19 Testing Guidelines WHOA “I’m concerned about the interpretation of these recommendations. I’m worried it will give people the incorrect assumption that asymptomatic spread is not of great concern.” “He said, ‘I was under general anesthesia in the operating room,’” CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta said, reading comments from Fauci, who had surgery last week to remove a polyp on his vocal cord. “‘Last Thursday was not part of any discussion or deliberation regarding these new testing recommendations… I’m concerned about the interpretation of these recommendations. I’m worried it will give people the incorrect assumption that asymptomatic spread is not of great concern. In fact, it is.’”
Cuomo Declares NY Will ‘Disregard’ CDC’s New COVID-19 Testing Guidance https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/...-disregard-cdcs-new-covid-19-testing-guidance New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced on Wednesday that his state will no longer follow COVID-19 testing guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), asserting that the agency has become too politicized by President Donald Trump to be credible. Following news that the CDC was changing its guidelines to state that asymptomatic people don’t need to be tested, Cuomo slammed the agency for “allowing the president to politically interfere with public health.” “We need a real public health watchdog in this nation,” the governor told Katy Tur. “We need public health people who do public health, and not politics. And we’re going to disregard the CDC guidance totally.” Cuomo pointed to Trump openly discouraging expansion of COVID-19 testing on the grounds that increased testing shows higher case numbers, which pose a major threat to his reelection chances in November. “This is all political propaganda,” the governor said. “The election season is in full cycle.” Listen to Cuomo below:
After being mocked by public health experts across the entire globe, the CDC rolls back its guidance... CDC director walks back change in coronavirus testing guidelines https://thehill.com/policy/healthca...ctor-walks-back-change-in-coronavirus-testing The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Thursday issued new guidance for coronavirus testing, days after a quiet change sparked protests from the scientific and medical communities. In a statement, 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. The CDC revised its testing guidance earlier this week, limiting tests to those who show symptoms. That change prompted 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 by political appointees outside of CDC. Redfield said the guidelines issued on Monday had been coordinated with the White House coronavirus task force. The new guidance comes as the number of coronavirus tests across the United States has fallen in recent weeks. But even his Thursday statement falls short of previous guidance, in which the CDC recommended contacts of those infected with the virus be tested specifically because of the threat of asymptomatic or presymptomatic transmission. After reaching a peak of nearly a million new tests a month ago, the number of tests conducted on a daily basis has declined to fewer than 700,000 over the last four days, according to data maintained by the COVID Tracking Project, an independent group of researchers.
CDC reduced to WH propaganda arm: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/...nterfered-with-cdc-reports-on-covid-19-412809 Trump officials interfered with CDC reports on Covid-19 The politically appointed HHS spokesperson and his team demanded and received the right to review CDC’s scientific reports to health professionals. The health department’s politically appointed communications aides have demanded the right to review and seek changes to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly scientific reports charting the progress of the coronavirus pandemic, in what officials characterized as an attempt to intimidate the reports’ authors and water down their communications to health professionals. In some cases, emails from communications aides to CDC Director Robert Redfield and other senior officials openly complained that the agency’s reports would undermine President Donald Trump's optimistic messages about the outbreak, according to emails reviewed by POLITICO and three people familiar with the situation. CDC officials have fought back against the most sweeping changes, but have increasingly agreed to allow the political officials to review the reports and, in a few cases, compromised on the wording, according to three people familiar with the exchanges. The communications aides’ efforts to change the language in the CDC’s reports have been constant across the summer and continued as recently as Friday afternoon. The CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports are authored by career scientists and serve as the main vehicle for the agency to inform doctors, researchers and the general public about how Covid-19 is spreading and who is at risk. Such reports have historically been published with little fanfare and no political interference, said several longtime health department officials, and have been viewed as a cornerstone of the nation's public health work for decades. But since Michael Caputo, a former Trump campaign official with no medical or scientific background, was installed in April as the health department's new spokesperson, there have been substantial efforts to align the reports with Trump's statements, including the president's claims that fears about the outbreak are overstated, or stop the reports altogether. Caputo and his team have attempted to add caveats to the CDC's findings, including an effort to retroactively change agency reports that they said wrongly inflated the risks of Covid-19 and should have made clear that Americans sickened by the virus may have been infected because of their own behavior, according to the individuals familiar with the situation and emails reviewed by POLITICO. Caputo's team also has tried to halt the release of some CDC reports, including delaying a report that addressed how doctors were prescribing hydroxychloroquine, the malaria drug favored by Trump as a coronavirus treatment despite scant evidence. The report, which was held for about a month after Caputo’s team raised questions about its authors’ political leanings, was finally published last week. It said that "the potential benefits of these drugs do not outweigh their risks." In one clash, an aide to Caputo berated CDC scientists for attempting to use the reports to "hurt the President" in an Aug. 8 email sent to CDC Director Robert Redfield and other officials that was widely circulated inside the department and obtained by POLITICO. "CDC to me appears to be writing hit pieces on the administration," appointee Paul Alexander wrote, calling on Redfield to modify two already published reports that Alexander claimed wrongly inflated the risks of coronavirus to children and undermined Trump's push to reopen schools. "CDC tried to report as if once kids get together, there will be spread and this will impact school re-opening . . . Very misleading by CDC and shame on them. Their aim is clear." Alexander also called on Redfield to halt all future MMWR reports until the agency modified its years-old publication process so he could personally review the entire report prior to publication, rather than a brief synopsis. Alexander, an assistant professor of health research at McMaster University near Toronto whom Caputo recruited this spring to be his scientific adviser, added that CDC needed to allow him to make line edits — and demanded an "immediate stop" to the reports in the meantime. "The reports must be read by someone outside of CDC like myself, and we cannot allow the reporting to go on as it has been, for it is outrageous. Its lunacy," Alexander told Redfield and other officials. "Nothing to go out unless I read and agree with the findings how they CDC, wrote it and I tweak it to ensure it is fair and balanced and 'complete.'" CDC officials have fought the efforts to retroactively change reports but have increasingly allowed Caputo and his team to review them before publication, according to the three individuals with knowledge of the situation. Caputo also helped install CDC’s interim chief of staff last month, two individuals added, ensuring that Caputo himself would have more visibility into an agency that has often been at odds with HHS political officials during the pandemic. Asked by POLITICO about why he and his team were demanding changes to CDC reports, Caputo praised Alexander as "an Oxford-educated epidemiologist" who specializes "in analyzing the work of other scientists," although he did not make him available for an interview. "Dr. Alexander advises me on pandemic policy and he has been encouraged to share his opinions with other scientists. Like all scientists, his advice is heard and taken or rejected by his peers," Caputo said in a statement. Caputo also said that HHS was appropriately reviewing the CDC's reports. “Our intention is to make sure that evidence, science-based data drives policy through this pandemic—not ulterior deep state motives in the bowels of CDC," he said. Caputo's team has spent months clashing with scientific experts across the administration. Alexander this week tried to muzzle infectious-disease expert Anthony Fauci from speaking about the risks of the coronavirus to children, and The Washington Post reported in July that Alexander had criticized the CDC's methods and findings. But public health experts told POLITICO that they were particularly alarmed that the CDC's reports could face political interference, praising the MMWRs as essential to fighting the pandemic. "It's the go-to place for the public health community to get information that's scientifically vetted," said Jennifer Kates, who leads the Kaiser Family Foundation's global health work. In an interview with POLITICO, Kates rattled off nearly a dozen examples of MMWR reports that she and other researchers have relied on to determine how Covid-19 has spread and who's at highest risk, including reports on how the virus has been transmitted in nursing homes, at churches and among children. "They're so important, and CDC has done so many," Kates said. The efforts to modify the CDC reports began in earnest after a May report authored by senior CDC official Anne Schuchat, which reviewed the spread of Covid-19 in the United States and caused significant strife within the health department. HHS officials, including Secretary Alex Azar, believed that Schuchat was implying that the Trump administration moved too slowly to respond to the outbreak, said two individuals familiar with the situation. The HHS criticism was mystifying to CDC officials, who believed that Schuchat was merely recounting the state of affairs and not rendering judgment on the response, the individuals familiar with the situation said. Schuchat has made few public appearances since authoring the report. CDC did not respond to a request for comment about Schuchat’s report and the response within the department. The close scrutiny continued across the summer with numerous flashpoints, the individuals added, with Caputo and other HHS officials particularly bristling about a CDC report that found the coronavirus spread among young attendees at an overnight camp in Georgia. Caputo, Alexander and others claimed that the timing of the August report was a deliberate effort to undermine the president's push on children returning to schools in the fall. Most recently, Alexander on Friday asked CDC to change its definition of “pediatric population” for a report on coronavirus-related deaths among young Americans slated for next week, according to an email that Caputo shared with POLITICO. “[D]esignating persons aged 18-20 as ‘pediatric’ by the CDC is misleading,” Alexander wrote, arguing that the report needed to better distinguish between Americans of different ages. “These are legal adults, albeit young.” Caputo defended his team’s interventions as necessary to the coronavirus response. “Buried in this good [CDC] work are sometimes stories which seem to purposefully mislead and undermine the President’s Covid response with what some scientists label as poor scholarship — and others call politics disguised in science,” Caputo told POLITICO. The battles over delaying or modifying the reports have weighed on CDC officials and been a distraction in the middle of the pandemic response, said three individuals familiar with the situation. "Dr. Redfield has pushed back on this," said one individual. "These are scientifically driven articles. He's worked to shake some of them loose." Kates, the Kaiser Family Foundation's global health expert, defended the CDC's process as rigorous and said that there was no reason for politically appointed officials to review the work of scientists. “MMWRs are famously known for being very clear about their limitations as well as being clear for what they've found," she said. Kates also said that the CDC reports have played an essential role in combating epidemics for decades, pointing to an MMWR posted in 1981 — the first published report on what became the HIV epidemic. “Physicians recognized there was some kind of pattern and disseminated it around the country and the world,” Kates said. “We can now see how important it was to have that publication, in that moment.”
https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/12/politics/cdc-trump-science-reports/index.html Trump's HHS alters CDC documents for political reasons, official says (CNN)Trump-appointed communications officials at the US Department of Health and Human Services pushed to change language to weekly science reports released by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention so as not to undermine President Donald Trump's political message, according to a federal health official. Amid tension between the administration and the CDC, former Trump campaign official turned chief HHS spokesman Michael Caputo and his team had demanded to see reports out of the CDC before they are released, a senior administration official said. Officials within HHS had defended the demand, saying that CDC fell under the agency's umbrella and that all communications and public documents needed to be cleared at the top. A federal official told CNN that in addition to reviewing reports, HHS political appointee Paul Alexander has regularly added his input -- often interpreted by CDC officials as political in nature -- to weekly scientific reports intended to track the ongoing coronavirus pandemic response. The development marks the latest example of political interference by administration appointees at the nation's health agencies. Politico first reported about the pressure being put on the CDC regarding these reports. The source said some federal health officials at the CDC believe the interference to be an effort to change communications by the CDC's scientists so as not to contradict the President. Since the beginning of the pandemic, Trump has repeatedly downplayed the significance of the virus, sometimes contradicting his own White House task force doctors. In a statement to CNN, Caputo defended the actions and praised Alexander. "Dr. Paul Alexander is an Oxford educated epidemiologist and a methodologist specializing in analyzing the work of other scientists. Dr. Alexander advises me on pandemic policy and he has been encouraged to share his opinions with other scientists," the statement read. "Like all scientists, his advice is heard and taken or rejected by his peers." Caputo went on to further slam the CDC, saying, "Our intention is to make sure that evidence, science-based data drives policy through this pandemic -- not ulterior deep state motives in the bowels of CDC." Trump loyalists and administration officials have expressed frustration at the CDC, which is largely made up of career not political employees, which they believe is not working in the best interest of the President. CNN has reached out to the CDC for comment. CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield has in the past defended the agency and denied officials there are putting politics ahead of science. The federal health official who talked to CNN added there have been efforts this summer by HHS to all together stop the release of some of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports, some of which have been focused on the latest information on coronavirus. The source could not provide specifics on what language was changed in these reports by the Trump administration. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...-caputo-cdc-covid-reports-politico-deep-state Trump ally who sought to change CDC Covid reports claims he was fighting 'deep state' Politico: emails show attempts to change key reports HHS spokesman Michael Caputo worked on campaign in 2016 Rage: Will Bob Woodward’s tapes bring down Donald The official, Michael Caputo, told the website he was attempting to stymie “ulterior deep state motives in the bowels” of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC.