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Dr Anthony Fauci was reportedly “annoyed” by the optics at a White House reporters’ dinner last week as the coronavirus pandemic continued.
Politico said in a telephone conversation with health experts on Thursday that Fauci “expressed disappointment with the growing feeling that the pandemic is over. He said he feared people would lose sight of the need to continue to protect the nation’s most vulnerable, according to four people on the call.
Although he refrained from criticizing anyone in the Biden administration, Fauci “asked why so many people feel comfortable gathering indoors without masks amid a new increase in Covid cases,” Politico reported on Friday.
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COVID White House Response Coordinator Ashish Ja, who attended the dinner after dispelling health concerns about the event, was on the call but reportedly did not respond to Fauci’s remarks.
“Looking back, I wonder what the hell was going through Ashish’s mind at that moment,” one participant told Politico.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, spoke at a hearing on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on Capitol Hill, Thursday, November 4, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo / Alex Brandon) (AP Photo / Alex Brandon)
Both President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden, as well as other senior administration officials, attended the WHCD on Saturday, but there was a reported COVID outbreak among journalists who attended the event, although it is unclear whether they contracted the dinner virus. .
Among the journalists who caught COVID-19 was ABC News correspondent Jonathan Carl, who was seen shaking hands with Biden at dinner.
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Earlier, Fauci announced that he would not attend the dinner, citing fears of COVID.
However, the NIAID director was caught unmasked attending a pre-dinner party with CNN presenter Don Lemon.
US President Joe Biden and journalist Stephen Portnoy attend the annual dinner of the White House Correspondents Association in Washington, DC, April 30, 2022. REUTERS / Al Drago (REUTERS / Al Drago)
In recent weeks, Fauci has been sending mixed signals about whether the United States is finally recovering from the pandemic.
Fauci told PBS NewsHour: “We are certainly out of the pandemic phase in this country right now.” He later offered a “clarification”.
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“I probably had to say the sharp component of the pandemic phase. And I understand how this can lead to some misinterpretation, “Fauci told NPR. “I was talking about the acute phase of the outbreak and everyone agrees that we are not there. We are not getting 900,000 new infections a day.”
Is the pandemic still here? Absolutely, “Fauci said. “So when I said phase, I probably had to say the acute stage of the pandemic phase. Now we are moving, but it is not there yet, but we are moving towards endemicity, where the level of infections is low enough that people are beginning to learn to live with the virus, which is still protected by vaccination, with the presence of antivirals means by testing. So I really meant the acute phase, not the pandemic. “
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