Dr. Nicole Saphier, a radiologist and director of breast imaging at Memorial Sloan Kettering Monmouth, is calling on the CDC and Biden administration to update its public health guidance with a more targeted approach
A top medical expert is going after President Joe Biden for his ‘mixed messaging’ on masks nearly two years into the coronavirus pandemic.
Dr. Nicole Saphier, a radiologist and director of breast imaging at Memorial Sloan Kettering Monmouth, urged the president to update public health guidance ‘based on science’ rather than ‘optics.’
‘The messaging around the utilization of face masks has been muddied since the beginning of the pandemic,’ Saphier told DailyMail.com.
‘Now, President Biden is sending mixed messaging when he is wearing a mask outside alone with his wife while walking his dog yet takes it off when he goes indoor to a retail store surrounded by people.’
The president and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden raised eyebrows on Tuesday evening when photos emerged of them with their new German Shepherd puppy, Commander, playing on the beach while wearing masks.
Both the Bidens are fully vaccinated and have received their booster shots. It’s unclear why they chose to wear masks on a strip of land populated only by them and the Secret Service — who were standing 10 yards away.
Biden was seen wearing a face covering, even after his wife removed hers, hours after chief medical adviser Dr Anthony Fauci admitted there was an ‘extremely low’ risk of contracting COVID indoors after getting fully vaccinated and he only continued to wear a mask to stop ‘giving mixed signals.’
It comes as the Omicron variant is fueling a new wave of COVID infections and wreaking havoc on the holidays. Recent studies have shown that while it’s more infectious, the mutated strain generally leads to less severe illness than the formerly dominant Delta strain.
Biden raised eyebrows when he wore a face mask on the beach on Tuesday despite only his wife and Secret Service anywhere nearby
The Omicron variant is helping fuel a new wave of COVID-19 infections, though early studies suggest it causes less severe illness than Delta
The US hit a new high for new daily average cases with 301,472 reported on Wednesday, smashing through the previous record of 264,546 new cases.
But Tuesday wasn’t the first time the first couple triggered nationwide mask confusion with their own actions, either.
Days before Christmas the Bidens invited the Northwell Health Nurse Choir to sing in the White House East Room for a holiday special that aired on PBS last week.
Despite the White House’s own mask mandate, some of the singing nurses displayed bare faces — and at one point in the performance video, a very awkward-looking Jill Biden looks on with nothing covering her face either.
And over Thanksgiving, Biden was seen flaunting Nantucket’s mask mandate on his family’s annual trip to the Massachusetts island. The president was maskless at several points while shopping for his grandchildren’s Christmas gifts.
‘The messaging on face masks need to be clear with transparent recommendations that are science-based and not to appease optics,’ Saphier said.
She urged the White House as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to amend their messaging on masks with a more targeted approach.
First Lady Dr. Jill Biden appeared to flaunt the White House’s mask rules last week when watching a performance of singing nurses in the East Room
The president was criticized for not following local mask guidance while shopping for holiday gifts over Thanksgiving in Nantucket
‘The CDC recommendations are due for an update. Single layer cloth masks have no utility at this point in the pandemic with a variant which demonstrates an exceedingly high level of transmission indicating aerosolized particles. Yet, children two and older are still being made to wear them despite zero data demonstrating their clinical benefit in the current scenario,’ the doctor explained.
During the week of December 21 through 27, an average of 334 children aged 17 and under were admitted per day to hospitals with the coronavirus, a 58 percent increase from the week before, according to the CDC.
The previous peak was in early September, when child hospitalizations averaged 342 per day.
However, doctors who spoke with the Associated Press have observed that many of their young patients appear to be less sick than those that came in during the summer’s Delta wave.
Rather than telling the public to cover their faces with any scrap of cloth available in both indoor and crowded settings, Saphier argued that officials setting public health policy should be ‘making sure high quality masks are available for high risk individuals and those who work in healthcare settings.’
The White House’s grim forecast for unvaccinated Americans drew criticism for its harsh language warning people not getting the jab that they’re in for a winter of ‘severe illness and death.’
Saphier said factors like the rising number of vaccinations and people with post-infection immunity should be considered for updated public health guidance
Meanwhile the Omicron variant has caused holiday chaos with Americans waiting in hours-long lines to get tested for COVID (pictured: People line up at a testing facility in Times Square on December 29 in New York City)
But Saphier believes that the growing percentage of the population who now have post-infection herd immunity, the apparently diminished severity of Omicron, along with the millions who are vaccinated, means we can go into the new year ‘maximizing life while minimizing severe illness.’
‘Cases are skyrocketing because of a highly transmissible, but thankfully, less virulent variant of SARS-CoV-2. Despite mask (and vaccine) mandates, new cases are rising as more people gather in the comfort of their homes during the cold holiday seasons,’ she said.
‘The growing wall of immunity from vaccinations, boosters and natural immunity are providing more protection from severe outcomes than generalized wearing of face masks ever could.’
Saphier had previously spoken out against politicizing the pandemic. She wrote a book titled ‘Panic Attack: Playing Politics with Science in the Fight Against COVID-19,’ published in May of this year.
She previously spoke to DailyMail.com in April when the doctor took issue with Fauci stating that herd immunity against the virus would be reached only when 85 percent of the US population is fully vaccinated.
Roughly eight months later the country still hasn’t reached that benchmark, with 61.9 percent of Americans with both jabs.
