PBS Platforms Bizarre Former CDC Official on Funding Cuts: 'People Will Die'
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PBS Platforms Bizarre Former CDC Official on Funding Cuts: 'People Will Die'

PBS’s Amanpour & Co., which is simulcast on CNN International, hosted guest Demetre Daskalakis on Monday’s edition and repped his appearance in an email with the subject line: “‘People Will Die:’ Fmr. CDC Official Warns Against HIV/AIDS Cuts.” Daskalakis resigned as director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases in August.   A deeper dive into the history of Daskaslakis’s politically correct hypocrisy during his Biden-era term at the Centers for Disease Control would have been instructive. But all we got from guest host Bianna Golodryga was commiseration against the ignorant rule of Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Junior. Golodryga explained that “In August, Dr. Demetre Daskalakis resigned from the CDC, accusing the agency under Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of ignoring science." The first item in his talk with reporter Hari Sreenivasan: The Trump Administration's awful failure to promote the purely symbolic World Aids Day. Daskalakis was asked about the discontinuation of the USAID program PEPFAR, which fights AIDS via antiretroviral therapy in the Third World. DASKALAKIS: PEPFAR's future is tenuous at best....if PEPFAR goes away, that means stopping the entire story. And, you know, that's going to not mean just some strange policy issue, it's going to mean that people will die. Sreenivasan mildly challenged his guest with what he termed “the State Department's rationale, we're thinking is, look, we have to stop being the people that are the only ones that are writing the check. We have to transition this to the host countries." Daskalakis conveniently donned a patriotic hat and warned that to cut off U.S. taxpayer funding would be immoral, given America's “moral responsibility.” DASKALAKIS: ….I think the other part that is important is, you know, the U.S. is the global leader in public health. It is our moral responsibility to support these countries. And if we decide to change our funding strategy, we need to do it in a way that, in fact, does not let people die…. Asked why HIV was still a large “public health problem in the United States,” Daskalakis blamed….not celebrating World AIDS Day. Yes, really. DASKALAKIS: Your answer is what happens when the country decides not to celebrate or commemorate World AIDS Day. This is a stigma and access game in the United States. People do not access care. They don't access testing because it's scary. It -- people are made invisible because of the stigma that is getting even worse in the United States with some of the activity against LGBT people are made invisible because of the stigma that is getting even worse in the United States with some of the activity against LGBTQ health…. Daskalakis’s hysterical anti-Trump rants went unmentioned, like when he appeared on MSNBC (MSNOW) to screech “This is where fascism lives” after resigning in a huff in a letter that referred to “pregnant people” – a detail that alone should disqualify him from any position of medical expertise (men can’t get pregnant, as most of us know). He has also posed for public photos wearing a leather pentagram harness and downplayed the sexually transmitted disease Monkeypox for libertine reasons. Schools were shuttered at the small risk of COVID spread, but promiscuous nightlife was protected. As Daskalakis himself said, “You know, one person’s idea of risk is another person’s idea of a great festival or Friday night.”