Tony's Diary Package — page 25

PRESS: FOX News with Molly Line; Feb. 16, 2020 - 69,275/1670 (Sunday) Big discussion on phone with Kadlec, Anne Schuchat and Kevin (ASPR) on whether to remove a person from the evacuation plane who recently showed to be positive. Original plan was that anyone who was infected would not board plane evacuating people from the Diamond Princess. Now Kadlec and Kevin want to board them since people on the bus waiting to board have already been exposed on the bus to several people who are infected. Washington Post story by Jasmeen Abutaleb has me defending Azar against slurs against him (covertly by administration officials). I also say that w need to be fair to the POTUS (see below): "In fairness to the president, someone told him something that has a basis in reality. ... There is some validity in saying respiratory viruses like flu and coronavirus are seasonal," Fauci said. "The only thing is when you're dealing with a pandemic-type virus that is brand new, there's no way of knowing what's going to happen when the weather gets warm." Some officials have complained that Trump's comments about the virus emanate from his briefings with Azar, who they say has been overly controlling in the response and has told other doctors not to get too far into the details of the virus and the outbreak with Trump. Azar is disliked by many in the White House, four administration officials say. Fauci, however, said Azar has brought medical professionals with him to nearly every briefing and insisted they be part of Oval Office meetings. Azar "always defers to the scientists. That's the reason why whenever we're in the Situation room and the president would like some briefing, Alex always takes me and (CDC director) Bob Redfield in with him," Fauci said. "He always wants us to give the straight scientific information to the president." PRESS: Face the Nation (Margaret Brennan);