Fauci says Covid response was hampered by ‘disinformation and political ideology’ in farewell essay

Public health expert often had to battle Trump administration on basics of pandemic response

Anthony Fauci, who for many Americans became the champion of a science-first approach to tackling the pandemic, is retiring from his position as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases this month.

In a farewell essay, he argued that the US could have had an even more effective response to Covid, were it not for the deep polarisation of American politics and culture at large.

“We also must acknowledge that our fight against C‌‌ovid-19 has been hindered by the profound political divisiveness in our society,” Dr Fauci wrote in a New York Times opinion piece on Sunday. “In a way that we have never seen before, decisions about public health measures such as wearing masks and being vaccinated with highly effective and safe vaccines have been influenced by disinformation and political ideology.”

It’s a topic the doctor knows from personal experience. Throughout the pandemic, his high-profile position and regular appearances on TV made him a lightning rod for criticism from conservative politicians, media figures and even one of the presidents he was actively serving, Donald Trump.

On Fox News, hosts compared Dr Fauci and his advocacy for widely accepted public health measures like masking and vaccines to Nazi war criminals.

In Congress, Senator and fellow doctor Rand Paul resorted to conspiracy theories and seemed to single-handedly blame Dr Fauci for funding disease research in China that he claims led to the pandemic, then accused the doctor of attempting to “obscure responsibility for four million people dying, prompting a widely seen shouting match.

Even within the White House, Dr Fauci’s advice was contradicted at nearly every turn by Mr Trump, who pushed dangerous pseudoscience Covid cures, initially cast doubt on vaccines and steadfastly refused to ever wear a mask or admit his vaccination status until after leaving the White House.

What’s more, Mr Trump actively worked to sideline Dr Fauci, allowing senior White House staff to disparage him in the press, leaking lists of alleged “mistakes” the popular doctor made to the press and eventually barring him from public appearances.

“I was trying to let science guide our policy, but [Mr Trump] was putting as much stock in anecdotal things that turned out not to be true as he was in what scientists like myself were saying,” Dr Fauci told The Telegraph last February. “That caused unnecessary and uncomfortable conflict where I had to essentially correct what he was saying, and put me at great odds with his people.”

Taken together, the doctor argues the Trump administration was “poisoning the well” and making its supporters doubt life-saving public health measures.

However, Dr Fauci is not without his liberal critics too, some of whom have accused him of playing politics himself by not going far enough to challenge the Trump administration.

The public health expert has survived seven different presidential administrations in his post – a rarity in Washington – in part by knowing how to be effective scientifically without harming himself politically.

As a result, some have argued Dr Fauci hewed too close to the Trump party line early on during the pandemic by downplaying the need for masks and travel restrictions and failing to forcefully criticise the one-time president and his allies’ many wild, unfounded claims about Covid.