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An oft-cited cable news medical guest who was critical of school re-opening efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic said he did more to keep schools open than most, triggering an avalanche of criticism from the right.
Dr. Peter Hotez, a virologist and pediatrician who serves as a professor Baylor College of Medicine, has become a familiar face to millions of Americans who watched his appearances on CNN and MSNBC to discuss coronavirus and mitigation measures against it over the past two years, and he took aim at critics on Sunday while declaring he did more for schools reopening than “the wing nuts,” a derisive term for far-right conservatives.
“I certainly did a lot more to keep schools open than the wing nuts…and never took a dime for it,” he tweeted Sunday, adding he “worked tirelessly with school teachers, principals, school board advising them on how to keep schools open safely, and also to encourage school vaccinations.”
Except Hotez had quite the opposite sentiment for much of the pandemic.
Peter Hotez, founding dean and chief of the Baylor College of Medicine National School of Tropical Medicine, speaks during a House Science, Space and Technology Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Thursday, March 5, 2020.
(Sarah Silbiger/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In August 2020, Hotez made at least three CNN appearances where he urged states experiencing high virus transmission should not reopen schools.
“We can’t open schools safely in these areas where there’s this accelerated virus transmission, we can’t put this on the backs of the principals and the teachers to figure it out,” Hotez said. “We need leadership with the federal government to contain this virus and then we can start thinking about safely opening up schools, but not under these circumstances.”
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