Anthony Fauci: Harassed American doctor

Saturday, February 1, 2020 was almost 6:45 p.m., when Dr. Anthony Fauci fired the email that would make him the biggest controversy of his time as one of America’s foremost public scientists.

“Thank you Kristian. Talk to you soon and keep up the good content. ”

While the response was harmless, the context was explosive. Kristian Andersen, a professor of immunology at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, had been telling Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, that the virus causing the Covid pandemic -19 showed signs of having been manipulated. in a laboratory.

Andersen’s message, published this week as part of a 3,000 pages of Fauci’s emails, which dates back to the beginning of the pandemic, has helped reinforce the theory that the disease began after a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Andersen later disallowed this theory.

The email exchange has intensified claims that Fauci publicly downplayed the possibility of a lab leak, even while holding a conversation with other scientists about its possible merits.

Now, the man nicknamed the “doctor of the United States” faces calls for resignation and a barrage of criticism from the right over his insistence that the pandemic probably has its roots in wild animals, rather than a Chinese laboratory.

“There are a lot of questions that Dr. Fauci has to answer,” said Donald Trump, the former president whom Fauci served as an advisor, after the emails were published. Trump supporters, many of whom accuse Fauci of exaggerating the severity of the pandemic, have gone further. Josh Hawley, the Republican senator from Missouri, on Friday urged Fauci to resign.

Sometimes I had to contradict what [Trump] he said because what he said was not right. . . I’m not the enemy, I’m just trying to get the truth out

Fauci himself admits to being worried. However, not about the bounce, but about what it says about America. “I care about what he says about this country,” he told the Financial Times.

“Emails show someone who always evaluates data as it evolves. But people selectively remove emails to distort reality. “

Fauci, 80, is one of the most well-known and respected doctors in the United States.

After advising all presidents since Ronald Reagan, he rose to fame in the scientific world for his work on HIV in the 1980s, when he was one of the first public doctors to sound the alarm about a new disease. strange identified among gay men. He gained the respect of gay activists after he helped change the way medical trials were run so that more people could access life-saving treatments.

“Tony revolutionized the way clinical trials are conducted against HIV,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota and a friend of Fauci. “He’s a great doctor, but he’s also a natural leader and he knows how to do things.”

Fauci played a prominent role in U.S. responses to Sars, Mers, and the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak, when U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was set on fire for its response.

“There was a time when CDC was being unfairly attacked,” said Tom Frieden, who at the time was director of CDC. “A lot of people in this situation would have stood by or even piled up quietly, but Tony did exactly the opposite. He defended us internally and defended us publicly. He’s a man.”

Fauci has been one of the highlights of the US Covid response. He has become famous for his frequent television appearances in which he discusses in clear terms and with his broad New York accent the severity of the pandemic.

His willingness to contradict Trump’s claims, such as the claim that Covid-19 is similar to the flu, earned him an army of fans.

Garden signs in Washington, DC and elsewhere state, “Thank you, Dr. Fauci.” His approval rating in February was 60%, just above that of Joe Biden, whose president now works as chief medical adviser.

Others, however, believe he was undermining Trump for political reasons. Paul Mango, who was deputy chief of staff to the Trump administration’s health department, said: “Tony Fauci is a good man and a great scientist, but unfortunately he has made himself a political figure and that it has caused him to lose credibility. “

Fauci denies it: “Sometimes I had to contradict what [Trump] he said because what he said was not right. That’s why there seem to be radical people around who think I’m the enemy. I’m not the enemy, I’m just trying to get the truth out. “

His reputation as the one who tells the truth is now threatened.

He has been accused of helping fund risky research at the Wuhan lab through a $ 600,000 grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health to work on bat coronavirus. And his critics say his insistence that the origins of the disease are likely to be found in wild animals is less a reflection of the evidence than his desire to protect his institution.

Fauci he told the FT he continues to believe that the “overwhelming probability” is that the Sars-Cov-2 virus will be transmitted to humans from animals.

But he also admits that some of the work done in the Wuhan lab with NIH money could have violated safety standards, even if he says the responsibility lies with EcoHealth Alliance, the non-governmental group that did the work.

“We’ll have to go back and look at it,” he said about allegations that some of the coronavirus work was carried out at the second level of biosafety, roughly equivalent to that of a dentist’s office. “But that’s something that should have been overseen by the EcoHealth Alliance.”

EcoHealth Alliance did not respond to requests for comment.

Fauci continues to respond to emails late at night, from fellow professionals, journalists and members of the public. “I now have four hours of sleep,” he said.

Friends worry that in the face of such hard work and the constant threat of attack from Trump supporters, he may soon decide to take a step back from public life. But he insists this will not happen.

“I’ve never thought about quitting,” he said. “I’ll have had enough when we nail this bud and crush it.”