Dr. Anthony Fauci left government in December, but his media tour is going strong, albeit with a different tone and tenor. The fawning adulation and questions about his exercise regimes and bobbleheads have been replaced by skepticism and outright doubt from outlets who never dared question the all-knowing man once dubbed "America’s doctor" by The New Yorker.
Fauci recently appeared on CNN to complain about, "a personification of me as a person who essentially closed everything down." He was responding to a lengthy sit down with the New York Times where he declared, "Show me a school that I shut down and show me a factory that I shut down. Never. I never did. I gave a public-health recommendation that echoed the C.D.C.’s recommendation, and people made a decision based on that."
For all his faults, Fauci is no fool. One does not spend 54 years ensconced in the federal government without learning how to play politics.
Three years removed from the worst of the COVID pandemic, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases knows the policy decisions guided by his medical recommendations are looking worse by the day.
Herein lies his problem. When his ideas were in vogue, Fauci had no problem claiming responsibility. Now that the ugly consequences are coming due, he is eager to wash his hands.
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In the face of plummeting math and reading scores between 2020 and 2022, Fauci is especially quick to deny his role in the school shutdowns. Last fall, Fauci raised eyebrows for denying that school lockdowns, "forever irreparably damaged anyone."
Yet as late as September 2020, Fauci recommended that schools only open back up once the virus is "under control." Earlier in the year, he had chastised Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, warning that premature re-opening "likely" lead to widespread student infection.
Today, even left-leaning sources concede that, "kids are safe. They always have been."
Then came the vaccines. From the outset, Fauci’s entire COVID mitigation strategy was based on an experimental vaccine rushed to market under the branding "warp speed." There had never been an mRNA-approved vaccine before, and now it was being pushed non-stop from the White House podium with the full support of the pharmaceutical industry.
It was always highly illogical to deploy a static vaccine toward a mutagenic and constantly changing coronavirus. Then came the checks the vaccines couldn’t write. Fauci told us they would stop transmission. He implored us to "follow the science."
Today, the science is clear: the COVID vaccine does not prevent transmission or contagion of the virus. Yet even now, Fauci continues to lament that "only 68 percent of the country is vaccinated" and says "we do really poorly" compared to the rest of the world.
European countries like Switzerland, normally held up by American academics as worthy of emulation, are advising their citizens against the vaccine. There’s a reason that known vaccine expert Robert Kennedy Jr. is already earning the support of nearly one in five Democrat voters.
In my private practice, I have treated more than 500 patients suffering injuries from the vaccine, I have seen the unintended -- but brutal -- harm they’ve often caused up close and personal. Yet to raise any of these issues is to risk one’s livelihood. That is Fauci’s greatest stain on our country.
Fauci fostered an environment where doctors who deviated from the preferred party line were persecuted and even criminalized for offering a different point of view. Silencing free expression and thought is the antithesis of America, and dangerous for science, innovation, and medicine.
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Fauci blamed "misinformation and disinformation" for "really hurting so many things, including people's trust in science," yet on his watch, laws were passed that empowered government agencies to strip doctors of their medical licenses for questioning the wisdom of vaccines.
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These efforts left a profound lasting impact on medicine and the patient-doctor relationship. Suddenly physicians were forced to choose between offering their best advice or losing their ability to practice medicine.
Anthony Fauci’s legacy is one of narcissism and power. The glorification of his massive ego trumped any scientific or medical data. His policies were giveaways to the pharmaceutical industry, which helped burnish his image and crush dissent. He saw his opportunity for the spotlight and seized it. Now, rather than admit mistakes, Fauci is intent on revising history. Unfortunately for his legacy, we’re all living with the consequences of his hubris, and they are impossible to overlook.