Breast radiologist Nicole Saphier once again played an infectious disease and public health specialist, this time signaling Fox viewers to ignore the recent rise in COVID cases.

Media Matters noted yesterday that Fox and the right-wing are using a rise in COVID cases to promote new divisiveness, seemingly inspired by Alex Jones. They are fearmongering that “’full COVID-19 lockdowns,’ including ‘mask tyranny’ and a ‘vax scheme,’ will be implemented as part of a nefarious plot to steal the 2024 election from Donald Trump,” Media Matters reported.

Dr. Nicole Saphier did her part for the effort on a Fox "news" show today. Like Fox legal analyst Jonathan Turley, Saphier is really there to add a veneer of credibility to the network's propaganda. Because if Fox wanted real medical credibility, it would not turn to a breast radiologist to tell viewers how to deal with a rise in cases.

Saphier was nowhere near as inflammatory as host Laura Ingraham who, Media Matters noted, earlier this week cited new mask mandates at Morris Brown College and Lionsgate studios “to argue the left is pushing a ‘sense of panic’ in order to ‘set up even more restrictions ahead of the 2024 election cycle.’ Later, a chyron warned, “Left laying groundwork for more COVID restrictions,” and, “Medical cartel pushes endless vax scheme.”

But Saphier’s anti-COVID protection message was unmistakeable. It was no surprise coming from a woman who thinks Americans have too much health insurance, advocated for removing COVID patients from ventilators so that they either survive or die, and arguing that COVID should be allowed to spread.

More to the point, Saphier laid a professional-sounding foundation for the more extreme commentary.

Saphier acknowledged that COVID cases are indeed rising. But she dismissed any rise in hospitalizations as a normal “ebb and flow.”

SAPHIER: [Y]es, you're seeing COVID cases on the rise. Good news is hospitalizations are about 20 to 25% now, what they were last year. So hospitalizations are still down, but you're going to see an uptick in hospitalizations because the more people who test positive, you're going to have some hospitalizations. It's just the ebb and flow of this. It's going to be, you know, cold, COVID and flu season. So we're going to kind of have a lot of respiratory viruses and every winter, fall you're going to see a rise in cases.

Just one of those things if you're part of the flow, I guess. Anchor Aishah Hasnie seemed fine with it, too.

Next, Saphier cast some doubt on an upcoming vaccine designed to target the new variants:

SAPHIER: It is likely that the upcoming fall booster shot may still offer some protection, but the truth is we don't exactly know.

Hasnie pressed for more. Two weeks ago, she was full of anti-Biden sympathy for families of fallen soldiers in Afghanistan. But for Americans here at home, Hasnie hyped right-wing attacks on public health measures by asking a “question.”

HASNIE: So, these colleges like Morris Brown College in Atlanta that are going way back to those 2020 mandates practically back to when COVID first started, not only mask mandates, but also temperature checks, social distancing, contact tracing, no large gatherings. Some people are calling that hysteria. Is it?

I’m sure nobody was surprised by Saphier’s response.

SAPHIER: Hysteria, I mean, maybe you can call it that but ultimately all the data has shown that these mandates don't actually decrease transmission. If you want to wear masks or high quality masks, they do confer some protection and recommend them really to people 65 and older, those who are immunocompromised. But on an individual basis. These mask mandates and mandates and boosters for all have no place going into 2023.

Saphier didn’t even recommend viewers consult their own physicians as to what preventive measures to take. More importantly, data shows that mask mandates do slow transmission.

Hasnie gave Saphier a thumbs up by citing an even less qualified “expert.” “Yeah, you’ve got Congressman Marjorie Taylor Greene down there basically saying Americans have had enough, we will not comply,” Hasnie said, with gusto.

You can watch these two sickening propagandists below, from the August 26, 2023 Fox News Live.