On Monday morning, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro argued that his background in social science means he has the aptitude for handling the COVID-19 outbreak.
CNN anchor John Berman asked Navarro about his stormy argument with National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Dr. Anthony Fauci at a Situation Room meeting, during which the adviser had insisted that a flawed study proved that hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug, would treat COVID-19.
As Fauci pointed out in the meeting and in public, there is no hard data that hydroxychloroquine would be effective against the coronavirus.
“What are your qualifications to weigh in on medicine more than Dr. Anthony Fauci?” Berman asked Navarro on Monday. “Why should we listen to you and not Dr. Fauci?”
The adviser dug in his heels, saying that doctors “disagree about things all the time.”
“My qualifications in terms of looking at the science is that I’m a social scientist,” Navarro told the anchor. “I have a Ph.D., and I understand how to read statistical studies, whether it’s in medicine, the law, economics, or whatever.”
The White House official kept pushing the one unreliable study on hydroxychloroquine, arguing that “you could be a plumber and read that and come to the same conclusion.”
Watch Navarro below:
Top WH trade adviser feuded with others on whether hydroxychloroquine can treat coronavirus, sources say.@JohnBerman: “Why should we listen to you and not Dr. Fauci?”
Peter Navarro: “… I’m a social scientist. I have a Ph.D. And I understand how to read statistical studies.” pic.twitter.com/Ky99CIAZfj
— New Day (@NewDay) April 6, 2020
WH Trade Adviser Claims He’s Qualified To Speak On COVID-19 Treatment Because He’s A ‘Social Scientist’
What he is, is an idiot.
And I thought the idea that the Chinese intentionally unleashed the virus on us was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard. This tops that.
I have a degree in social science, too. I’m still going to defer to Dr. Fauci on all things COVID-19 related. What an idiot.
C’mon. He’s not even qualified to speak on the ECONOMY or TRADE POLICY…he screws up everything he touches but ‘somehow’ he is ‘qualified’ to overrule Dr. Fauci because he has an ‘opinion’? Another incompetent Trumpster.
[“On Monday morning, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro argued that his background in social scientist means he has the aptitude for handling the COVID-19 outbreak.”].
History is a social science and Navarro IS history. (like GONE)