"This was not a Polyannish view and I have never been called Polyannish"

In Birx’s Sunday interview with CNN’s Dana Bash, she used much of her time to fend off criticism about the federal government’s pandemic response in light of national case spikes throughout July. When asked for her response to Pelosi, Birx said she had “tremendous respect” for the house speaker, but then she pivoted toward an “unfortunate” The New York Times report saying she only supplies good news to Trump.

“It was unfortunate that The New York Times wrote this article without speaking to me. I could have brought forth the data. I provide data every single day with an analysis. The day that they are talking about that I was, quote, Polyannish, it said there was improvement in the New York metro, but ongoing cases in Boston and Chicago and new outbreak in Houston and full-log rhythmic spread and new, concerning outbreaks in Baltimore and New Haven and Washington, D.C. This was not a Polyannish view and I have never been called Polyannish or non-scientific or non-data driven, and I will stake my 40 year career on those fundamental principles of using data to really implement better programs to save more lives.”