The British newspaper The Guardian raised eyebrows for dubbing Dr. Anthony Fauci "sexiest man alive" at the top of a social media post.
On Monday, The Guardian took to Instagram and shared a photo of the NIAID director striking a pose in a photoshoot, writing how "an 80-year-old scientist, doctor and public servant, has become an unlikely cult hero for millions of people during the Covid pandemic."
"The US diseases expert has been spoofed by Brad Pitt and lauded as the ‘sexiest man alive,'" The Guardian posted on Instagram.
The Instagram post was plugging an upcoming documentary titled "Fauci" set to be released this fall.
"At the core of Tony’s popularity is that people intuit that this is a man who is speaking the truth and will not let anything stand in the way," co-director John Hoffman told The Guardian. Tony is the signal amid the noise. People are able to sense that there’s a lot of noise and their ears are trying to find the signal and Tony is the signal."
Instagram users flooded the comments, writing things like "You must be joking" and sharing the puking emoji. Others asked if it was "satire" and declared it "propaganda."
"The Guardian used to be a serious newspaper, but with this they lost it completely!" one Instagram user exclaimed.
"It's real," Spectator contributor Stephen Miller shared on Twitter.
"Just when you think the media can’t get more absurd…" said another critic.
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In the early months of the pandemic, over 28,000 Fauci fanatics signed a Change.org petition urging People Magazine to declare the COVID task force member "sexiest man alive."
Fauci continues to be a media darling despite several contradictions he has made during the outbreak. Critics have accused him of lying to Congress when he denied that U.S. funding went towards gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology following documents obtained by The Intercept indicating otherwise.