WASHINGTON – Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser and a leading officer in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, has tested positive for COVID-19, the National Institutes of Health said.
The NIH said in a statement that the 81-year-old Fauci had been fully vaccinated and had been reinforced twice. He has mild symptoms and has not been in close contact with President Biden or other senior government officials recently, the agency said.
Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984, received a positive result from a rapid antigen test and will return to work at the NIH when tested negative, the agency said.
Fauci has been a key and sometimes polarizing figure in the nation’s efforts to combat the pandemic since its inception in early 2020, advising both former President Donald Trump and President Biden on the federal response. He has managed to avoid COVID-19 infection so far – more than two years after the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a global pandemic.
Fauci became a prominent name during the pandemic, appearing frequently with Trump during White House personal briefings in the early days of the public health emergency and in online briefings conducted by Mr. Biden’s COVID response team. 19 after he took over the presidency.
During appearances on Capitol Hill, Fauci often argued with Republican senators about mitigation efforts, including requirements for wearing masks and tests.
His heightened public profile has led to threats and harassment against him and his family, he told a Senate committee in January. In late 2020, a California man was arrested after police in Iowa allegedly found weapons in his car and an obvious list of those killed named Fauci. A West Virginia man also pleaded guilty last month to sending threatening emails to Fauci and former NIH director Dr. Francis Collins.
Fauci is now joining a long line of federal officials who, despite being vaccinated and reinforced, have tested positive for COVID-19, including Vice President Kamala Harris, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and various members of Mr. Biden’s cabinet. .
In January, he predicted that the highly contagious version of Omicron “would eventually find almost anyone”, but noted that Americans who were vaccinated and boosted would do “reasonably well”, given that vaccines protect against hospitalization and death.
Fauci was due to appear with other senior federal health officials before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on Thursday to provide an update on the federal response to COVID-19.
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