Fox's Dr. Marc Siegel: If you're “under 70 it's almost impossible you are going to die” from COVID
Tucker Carlson: “The vast majority of Americans face no risk, virtually no risk” from coronavirus
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From the September 25, 2020, edition of Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight
TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): More than 200,000 people have died. But that doesn't mean that everyone is at risk. The details actually matter. So as part of our ongoing commitment to science on this show we are going to give you the new CDC numbers. And they show the vast majority of Americans face no risk, virtually no risk. For people aged one year to 69 years, the survival rate post-infection with COVID is over 99%. For young people under the age of 20, which is most college students, who are being thrown out of school for congregating outside, the survival rate from the CDC is 99.997%. Why are we doing this again? Particularly on college campuses? Dr. Marc Siegel has thought a lot about this, he has covered the story from day one. He is of course our Fox News medical contributor. We are happy to have him on tonight. Doctor, good to see you.
MARC SIEGEL (FOX MEDICAL CONTRIBUTOR): Hi, Tucker. The media obsessing on the number 200,000, right? We are looking at both sides of this. We are looking at the death rate. We are looking at the number 200,000. We take it very seriously. But we're also looking at this good news about survival improving, increasing. Now, first, on the 200,000, I want to point out that a new study out of Oxford showed that over 30% of those deaths are not COVID. There are other causes and they also happen to have COVID. The second point about that is that most of the deaths, 35 to 50% are still occurring in nursing homes. And a lot of that is preventable.
But that's why the statistic you just said that over the age of 70 is where the deaths are occurring. Under 70 it's almost impossible you are going to die, and, yet -- from COVID. And yet fear messaging continues.