JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Florida Governor Ron DeSantis held a roundtable with public health experts in Tallahassee on Monday.
DeSantis was joined by Dr. Scott Atlas, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, and Dr. Martin Kulldorff via video call.
During the roundtable, he referenced another roundtable discussion he held where the video had been pulled from Youtube because it reportedly violated the social media platform’s standards.
The video of DeSantis’ roundtable discussion last month at the state Capitol in Tallahassee was removed because it violated the social media platform’s standards, YouTube spokesperson Elena Hernandez told NBC.
“YouTube has clear policies around Covid-19 medical misinformation to support the health and safety of our users,” Hernandez said in a statement to NBC. “We removed AIER’s video because it included content that contradicts the consensus of local and global health authorities..."
Based on a transcript provided by YouTube, NBC reports that when DeSantis asked whether children in school should be wearing masks and one expert said, “Uh, children should not wear face masks, no. They don’t need it for their own protection, and they don’t need it for protecting other people either.”
On Monday, DeSantis clarified and said that many health experts agree that children under a certain age do not need to wear masks and that censorship by mass media had to end.
He fires back at Youtube for removing the video for misinformation while it also regularly hosts conspiracy theory videos.
"You can pretty much find any misinformation under the sun on Google Youtube," said DeSantis. "Now, Google Youtube has not been, throughout this pandemic, repositories of truth and scientific inquiry but instead of active enforcers of a narrative."
He also referenced a video uploaded by First Coast News' sister station, WTSP.
"When they took down the videos, posted by some of the local news outlets here in the state of Florida, they were really continuing what they've been doing for the past year, stifle debate and short circuit scientific inquiry...," he explained.
Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried offered the following statement regarding the roundtable.
“This Governor's unhinged, dangerous rhetoric on COVID-19 continued today, elevating fringe conspiracy theories and once again repeating the claim that children don't need to take the simple, common-sense precaution of wearing a mask – a claim so reckless, YouTube banned it last time...," she said in a press release. "...This Governor and his priorities are shockingly out of touch with what people are going through, and the complete lack of steady, responsible leadership has made this public health crisis worse than needed.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises that “people age 2 and older should wear masks in public settings and when around people who don’t live in their household.”
DeSantis has received a single-dose coronavirus vaccine last week, his office confirmed. He did so out of the public eye even as governors elsewhere across the political spectrum have been vaccinated publicly to reassure Americans that the shots are safe.
A spokesperson for the Republican governor initially declined to provide details, including when exactly the Republican governor received the dose. But it was later disclosed that the governor received the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.