NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — Dr. Anthony Fauci on Monday slammed former President Donald Trump of “poisoning the well” when it comes to COVID-19 vaccine awareness.
Case in point: Trump last week said during a live interview event with former Fox News host Bill O'Reilly that he had received his booster COVID-19 vaccine. The response from some supporters in the audience? A chorus of boos.
While the former president seemed to brush it off and said the boos were only was a “tiny group,” Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease specialist and chief medial advisor to President Joe Biden, said he was surprised by the reaction during an interview with CNN's "New Day."
“Well, I mean, I’m glad that the former President Trump is now talking about why it’s important to get vaccinated," Fauci said. "I was stunned by the fact that’s doing that, and he’s getting booed in some places for doing that, which means that you know, poisoning the well early on about, either not being enthusiastic or outright not pushing vaccines and discouraging vaccines now has the lingering effect."
Fauci continued, "And even when you come out and say go get vaccinated, some of the people that have been following his every word and what he does are now pushing back and not listening, which really tells you the strength of the divisiveness in our society, which I’ve always said to me is the biggest stumbling block about getting this pandemic under control.”
He added, “It really is no place for divisiveness politically when you have a classical historical unprecedented pandemic. It just doesn’t make any sense.”
In an interview last week with host John Berman on CNN’s “New Day,” Fauci made similar comments about the booing incident, saying, “It just doesn’t make any sense at all to boo someone who’s saying they did the right thing from a public health standpoint.”
He went on to praise the former president for taking the third shot, especially after Trump had made comments several months ago suggesting that he would not.
“I'm very pleased that he did say that and come out publicly and say that he has been vaccinated and boosted,” Dr. Fauci said.
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