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now from the Institute of

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0:49

Audio, The Axwiles, with

0:52

your host, David Axelrod. Anthony

0:56

Fauci has been my guest here many

0:58

times. Now he's written a memoir, Uncall,

1:00

about his life and career in public

1:02

health. Now he and I have talked

1:04

about his story before, but I wanted

1:06

to chat again because among

1:08

the seven presidents with whom he worked

1:11

are the two nominees for president this

1:13

year, Joe Biden and Donald Trump. We

1:16

spoke about his experiences with each

1:18

and how in his fifth decade

1:20

of public service, Dr. Fauci suddenly

1:22

became such a target. Here's that

1:24

conversation. Dr.

1:30

Fauci, great to see you again. Same

1:33

here, David. The last time we got together

1:35

here, you had just left your job of

1:37

40 some odd years and

1:41

the office that was home for you, probably more

1:43

home than home because you probably spent more time

1:45

there than you did at home. I

1:47

did, I did. And you

1:49

were starting off on this book project that has

1:51

now been realized, the book

1:53

Uncall, A Doctor's Journey in

1:56

Public Service. And you

1:59

poignantly described. leaving your

2:02

office for the last time. And

2:04

so I thought the appropriate place to

2:06

start would be to ask how you're

2:08

doing now in your new

2:10

life. I'm doing real well,

2:12

David. It's a

2:15

great belief to have gotten the book out

2:17

because when I did walk out

2:19

of the NIH for that last time, I

2:22

began in earnest literally hours and hours

2:24

a day working on

2:26

the book and editing what I had already

2:28

written and writing the new chapters. But

2:31

one of the things I did, which I really feel

2:33

good about because it's turning out real well, is that

2:35

I am now a distinguished

2:38

university professor at Georgetown University

2:40

with a dual appointment in

2:43

the School of Medicine and the School of Public

2:45

Policy. And what's so good about

2:47

that is that I had spent

2:49

the 54 years at the NIH dealing

2:52

with doctors and

2:54

sub-specialists and researchers with very

2:56

little, some but very little

2:59

exposure to students. Now I'm in the

3:01

middle of the Georgetown campus

3:03

and not only do I have exposure to medical

3:06

students and students in the School of Public

3:08

Policy, but I have

3:10

exposure to students at all of the

3:12

many schools at Georgetown. And it's really

3:15

wonderful to have that kind of close

3:17

interaction with very young people and young

3:19

minds that are willing to learn

3:21

and excited about things. It's really, I wouldn't

3:24

say surprising, but an unexpectedly

3:27

really big plus. Let

3:29

me ask you about that because you're

3:31

part of the book and

3:35

what I want to spend some time on

3:37

describes the challenges that

3:39

you had over the years,

3:41

but certainly over the last

3:43

several in the clash between

3:46

public health imperatives and politics

3:49

and the subversive nature of

3:52

social media and the

3:54

internet in that battle, in

3:56

that clash. And I don't

3:58

know whether you walk into class with

4:00

your security, but your

4:03

security people. But in

4:05

some ways, you are an icon

4:07

for people who are concerned about public

4:09

health for all the things you've achieved.

4:11

And another, I would imagine you're a

4:14

bit of a disincentive because of the

4:16

target that you've become. Do you talk

4:18

about the challenges in

4:21

public health that politics presents today?

4:23

You know, I do, David,

4:26

and it is a very unusual

4:28

situation now that was not present

4:30

back then because back

4:32

when I first started, as

4:34

you say, I went to the director of the Institute

4:36

for almost 40 years, there was

4:38

always political differences. I mean, during

4:41

the Reagan administration where I started

4:43

and then George H.W. Bush and

4:45

George W. Bush, and

4:47

then Clinton and Obama and Biden,

4:50

there was always in the

4:52

early years differences in ideology

4:54

that were respected with a

4:56

degree of civility and

4:59

not really divisiveness. So differences

5:01

in diversity did never, in

5:03

my experience, sink

5:06

into profound divisiveness.

5:08

So it's a different situation now.

5:10

So I do have

5:13

to address that because when public

5:15

health young people who are

5:17

thinking of going into public or

5:20

who are already in public health, see

5:23

what's happening, not only to me because

5:25

I'm a very visible person, but

5:27

I'm not the only public health person

5:29

or scientist who's being maligned

5:31

and hit with conspiracy

5:33

theories and ad hominomes. So

5:36

what I try to tell the young people is that,

5:39

although that's not what we would

5:41

like to see, that the gratification

5:43

and the feeling of accomplishment of

5:46

contributing to making the world a better

5:48

place, to contributing to the health and

5:51

the well-being of people far

5:53

outweighs the negative aspects of what we're

5:55

going through now. And I would hope,

5:58

and that's how I sort of end the world. the book with

6:01

the epilogue, I would hope that someday

6:03

we'll get to the point where we

6:06

start speaking to each other more instead of

6:08

fighting with each other. Yeah. Although

6:10

the epilogue, you know, of

6:12

your book is also a

6:15

very much a cautionary note

6:18

about what the implications of not doing

6:21

that are. And you know,

6:23

I should say to our listeners that I'm

6:25

not going to review the sweep

6:27

of your career in this podcast, first

6:29

of all, because we did that. We've

6:32

done that in several conversations right here.

6:35

And it's a remarkable story. And

6:37

you earned the Medal of Freedom

6:39

for your work. And that was before COVID.

6:42

And you've only added, in my view,

6:44

luster to it. And I would,

6:46

my colleague Sanjay Gupta did a podcast with

6:49

you this week and covered a lot of

6:51

this. And I commend

6:53

that to folks. But I really want

6:55

to talk, I'm concerned about

6:58

the implications of

7:01

this sort of movement

7:03

against science, against

7:05

experts generally. When

7:08

it comes to issues like public health, you

7:10

write at length in this book about

7:12

how that impacted when it came

7:15

to combating COVID. So talk a

7:17

little bit about that. Then

7:19

let's talk about what the implications are moving

7:22

forward. To me, it's a

7:24

very corrosive effect. And what it

7:26

is, it's a fundamental anti-science

7:29

effect that I came

7:31

into full collision with that

7:35

during my year in the Trump White House.

7:38

Because right in the beginning when I

7:40

was among others part of the coronavirus

7:43

task force, my relationship

7:45

with the president was actually a good relationship.

7:47

I describe it in the book that I

7:50

don't know whether it's two guys from New

7:52

York who kind of had a feel for

7:54

each other, one guy from Queens, one guy

7:56

from Brooklyn. It was fine. He

7:59

has his own. special way of bravado and

8:01

all that, but everybody knows that. That's not

8:03

unique with me. And

8:05

we did get along well until it

8:08

became clear that he wished

8:10

very much that the

8:12

outbreak would sort of disappear the

8:14

way flu does in March and

8:16

April. And when it became clear

8:19

to him that it was not going to do

8:21

that, he began saying things

8:23

that were not true. And

8:25

he had a Greek chorus

8:27

echoing what he was saying. First

8:31

that it would go away like magic, and that's

8:33

when I had to, in a very uncomfortable but

8:35

something I felt I had to do, was

8:37

to contradict him on that. And when it was

8:39

clear to everybody that it was not going to

8:42

go away with magic like magic, then

8:44

he invoked these magical

8:46

elixirs like hydroxychloroquine,

8:48

which there was no scientific data

8:50

whatsoever. I think he got the

8:52

idea from Laura Ingraham that she

8:54

mentioned on Fox News, I'm not

8:57

sure. And that's when things

8:59

started to get dicey because I had

9:01

to essentially say publicly when asked by

9:03

reporters that, no, that's not, it

9:06

doesn't work and it really can

9:08

hurt you. That's when

9:10

all of a sudden there was a

9:12

tremendous pushback against me

9:14

and science in general,

9:16

like clinical trials didn't matter. It

9:18

depends on who spoke to you

9:21

last. And the easiest way

9:23

to essentially put

9:25

down what a scientist is

9:27

saying that's contradictory to

9:29

what you're saying is to

9:31

just discredit science. And I was put

9:34

in a situation in the White House,

9:36

David, that was stunning

9:38

to me. And I described it in

9:40

the book where when it became

9:42

clear that I was saying

9:44

things that were contradictory to the president's agenda

9:47

of wanting everybody to think it was going

9:49

away so we could get back to

9:51

the election cycle. It was, I've

9:55

never heard this before, opposition research against

9:57

somebody on your own team.

10:00

And, you know, people like Peter Navarro

10:02

were writing, you know, editorials

10:05

in USA Today saying I didn't know what

10:07

I was talking about. When you get that

10:09

kind of conflict, the public… We

10:11

should point out Peter Navarro is

10:13

an economist. He's not a scientist,

10:15

a medical scientist. And so

10:19

his standing to make these judgments

10:21

is a little bit doubtful. Yeah.

10:24

Yeah. The end result was

10:27

that with the social media

10:30

spreading anything and everything that's

10:32

unedited, including things that are

10:34

frankly untrue, the

10:36

general public gets

10:39

confused, particularly when you

10:41

put on the air. You

10:43

could always find someone with

10:45

scientific credentials who will

10:47

say something absolutely preposterous. So

10:50

you have social media with

10:52

information, disinformation, and misinformation,

10:55

and you compound that with

10:57

finding somebody somewhere who's

11:00

going to say something preposterous. And the

11:02

general public, who's going about

11:04

their daily business trying to earn a

11:06

living and raise their family, come

11:09

to the conclusion that we don't

11:11

have any idea what's true. So maybe, you

11:13

know, the scientists don't know what they're talking

11:15

about. And that really

11:17

becomes corrosive because when you live in

11:19

an arena of denormalization,

11:21

of untruths, and that's the

11:23

terminology I use, it becomes

11:25

normalized. There's so much misinformation

11:28

and disinformation that

11:30

people throw up their hands and say, we don't have

11:33

any idea what's true, so we can't believe anything. And

11:36

that is, I think, corrosive, David, not only

11:38

to the system of public health. I think

11:40

it's corrosive to the social

11:42

order and our own democracy. Yeah.

11:45

You point out in the book that,

11:48

you know, the great disparity, which I think has been written

11:51

about 40 to 50 times,

11:53

more likely to have been a victim

11:55

of COVID if you hadn't been vaccinated

11:57

than vaccinated. But so there are real

11:59

tan, tangible implications of

12:01

this, if masking, if

12:04

vaccines, if public health

12:06

measures are discredited,

12:10

there are lives at stake. Well,

12:12

absolutely. In fact, if you look

12:15

at the clear, unequivocal data, particularly

12:18

early on, the

12:20

difference in hospitalizations and

12:22

deaths of vaccinated people

12:24

versus unvaccinated people, it

12:26

is multifold differences of a

12:29

higher incidence of hospitalization and

12:31

death among unvaccinated. And when

12:33

you do it by region, David,

12:36

it's stunning that when you look

12:38

at red states versus blue states, the

12:41

fact that you are someone of

12:43

a political ideology, which

12:45

leads you to not accept vaccination,

12:48

means you are at a greater

12:50

risk of dying. Now,

12:52

I'm not a political person. You know that. You've

12:54

known me for years. But

12:57

as a physician and a scientist, it

12:59

pains me to see that people are

13:01

making a choice that will

13:03

influence whether or not they get ill

13:05

or their family gets ill based

13:08

on a political ideology. That should

13:10

never, ever happen. You just had

13:12

the honor of appearing before a

13:14

House committee again recently,

13:16

but you write about some of

13:19

these hearings that you attended during

13:21

this period when you

13:23

were still in the

13:25

job. And one struck me,

13:27

which was Congressman Jordan,

13:30

now Chairman Jordan, assailing

13:33

you and saying, when will the

13:35

American people get their liberty and

13:37

freedoms back? And

13:40

it struck me, you know, the Declaration

13:42

of Independence talks about life, liberty, and

13:44

the pursuit of happiness as rights of

13:46

people, but they don't say you should

13:48

choose between them. It seems like life

13:50

is an important part of this. Yes.

13:52

And a lot of lives were cussed. But here's the

13:55

question I want to ask you. Part

13:57

of what drove this was,

13:59

in fact, People were being asked

14:01

to make a lot of sacrifices, and

14:04

either the public was going to

14:07

blame the politicians for that, or

14:09

they were going to blame, or

14:11

the politicians were going to blame the scientists.

14:14

And in an election year,

14:16

I think increasingly what happened

14:18

was the politicians blamed the

14:21

scientists. But there were legitimate

14:23

sacrifices that people were making

14:25

that were really difficult. Do you think you

14:28

as a policymaker or as an

14:31

advisor and the public health

14:33

establishment was sensitive enough to that? Yeah.

14:37

Well, first of all, David, we were not

14:39

perfect in our response, but you have to

14:41

go back, turn back the clock. And

14:44

well, first of all, look at the summation

14:46

of the data. We've lost 1.2 million people

14:48

in the United States, more

14:51

than almost any other country,

14:53

even lower middle income countries.

14:55

At the time decisions were

14:57

made to make recommendations, and

14:59

it's very interesting that I

15:01

was the spokesperson for

15:04

the coronavirus task force often because I

15:06

was asked to be in the media.

15:09

That for some reason or other, understandably,

15:11

I'm not blaming, people

15:13

thought that I solely made these decisions myself,

15:15

which was absolutely not the case, and that

15:18

could never have been. But I

15:20

accept the responsibility as part of a team

15:22

that did make those decisions. Those

15:24

decisions were made in a

15:27

situation, the context where

15:29

we were having 3,000 to 4,000

15:32

deaths per day, where

15:34

the freezer trucks were lined up in

15:37

front of Elhurst Hospital and New York

15:39

Hospital because there weren't enough room in

15:42

the morgue. You had to do something

15:44

desperate, shut things down,

15:47

the 15-day bend

15:49

and flatten the curve, followed

15:51

by an additional 30 days. That

15:53

was the right decision. What we

15:56

need to re-examine is

15:58

how long that was kept. up. How

16:00

long the schools were closed? Yeah, that

16:02

in particular. Yeah, I for one, if

16:04

you go back and look at the

16:07

record, very quickly we're

16:09

saying, let's do whatever we

16:11

can to quickly and safely get

16:13

the schools open. But there

16:15

was a great degree of disparity within

16:17

the country depending upon where you were,

16:20

where the schools were closed for a

16:22

long time, for a moderate amount of

16:24

time, for a little bit of time. Whatever

16:27

it is, we need to

16:29

go back in a

16:31

careful non-accusatory way and re-examine

16:35

lessons learned about

16:37

were the collateral effects of

16:40

the kind of restrictions, were they

16:42

things that on balance saved

16:44

more lives that was worth

16:46

the negative effect or was

16:48

the negative effect so profound that

16:51

we need to re-examine? That's the way to

16:53

do it. When you look at

16:55

the thing you referred to a moment ago,

16:57

David, the tenure of the

16:59

hearing at the house a

17:02

few weeks ago, there was nothing there

17:04

that was looking about doing anything better.

17:07

It was all ad hominem

17:09

and vitriol. That's not

17:11

the way you do lessons learned.

17:13

So it gets back to what you said a

17:16

moment ago. It attacked

17:18

the scientists for trying to save

17:21

lives, which is what we were

17:23

trying to do. Darrell Bock

17:25

I mean, we see variations of

17:27

that on other issues. Climate is

17:30

one example of that. People

17:33

don't want to be directed.

17:35

They don't want to be told what

17:37

they have to do, what they must do.

17:40

I mean, I find it sort of crazy

17:42

that we're in the sort of

17:45

meteorological environment we're in right now

17:47

where every single day there's extreme

17:49

weather all over the country

17:51

that is taking a larger and larger

17:53

toll, and yet we're

17:55

still assailing the climate

17:58

scientists who've been warning about this decades.

18:00

But that's a separate issue.

18:02

On the school issue, I

18:04

think there is ample evidence

18:07

now that the absence of

18:09

in-class participation had a really

18:11

deleterious effect to kids. Yes.

18:13

I mean, they fell way

18:15

behind and it completely

18:18

enraged parents. Why was—I

18:20

mean, you were there in both the Trump

18:22

and the Biden administration. Why wasn't there a

18:24

clearer directive? I remember, you know, and Jen

18:26

Psaki was here talking about this the other

18:29

day and as well, we're going to try

18:31

and get schools open one day a week,

18:33

which went over like a lead balloon. Was

18:36

it pressure from the teachers' unions? You

18:38

know, I think it was a complicated

18:40

issue, David. I don't know exactly what

18:42

the major driving force—but I realized early

18:44

on that we needed to do something.

18:47

And I kept on saying, you know,

18:49

one of the sayings that I was quoted for

18:51

was, you know, close the bars, open the schools,

18:54

is to get the kids back to school

18:56

as quickly and safely as possible. There was

18:58

a lot of pushback at that. It was

19:01

pushback sometimes— Probably from a lot of drunks

19:03

who wanted to be in the bars. But

19:05

anyway, go ahead. Yeah. Well,

19:07

maybe. But, you know, sometimes local

19:10

authorities, the mayors, governors

19:13

would want to, you know, because

19:15

of the concern of the

19:17

spread of virus in their community. The teachers' unions had

19:19

a lot to do with that. I mean, you can't

19:21

have a school open if the teachers are not going

19:23

to go to school. So I don't

19:25

think there was one thing that was

19:28

the cause of this prolonged, but

19:30

I was very uncomfortable and still

19:32

am. And when we go back

19:34

and look at it in a civil way

19:36

about how we can do better, I

19:39

think we need to get some people

19:42

who are unbiased with any political agendas

19:45

to try and figure out what the

19:47

cost-benefit ratio of that in

19:49

lives saved versus the deleterious effects on

19:51

the children. You've got to look at

19:53

it in an open way,

19:55

as opposed to essentially attacking everyone

19:57

that has done something that you don't know.

19:59

don't agree with in this environment

20:02

to find someone who's trusted, who

20:05

is unbiased and has no

20:07

political agenda is a

20:09

task. I was going to joke that I know that

20:11

guy. Let's find that guy. We're

20:16

going to take a short break and we'll be right

20:18

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Wireless. now,

22:05

back to the show. In

22:12

the book, I noticed you spent several

22:14

pages. There's a lot in this book,

22:17

but you devoted several pages to

22:19

the question of how this virus

22:21

began. Yeah. And

22:24

the reason was obvious because, and I think

22:26

this still came up in these hearings, that

22:28

there is this intimation that

22:30

somehow you were covering for yourself

22:32

and the Chinese because the

22:35

NIH had funded part of a

22:37

lab in Wuhan. And the accusation

22:40

of the president was that that's

22:42

where the virus began. You had

22:44

that discussion with him, I'm sure.

22:47

Well, no. He just came out when someone told

22:49

him that we were actually funding some research. He

22:51

came out and says, cancel that grant, which

22:54

you actually can't do legally.

22:57

But well, the president, I guess, can do whatever he wants

22:59

to do, but you really can't do that. He would say

23:01

so. Yeah, he would say so. But

23:04

once he did that, then everything started

23:06

about. It absolutely started from that lab,

23:08

when we don't know where it started

23:10

from. And if you look at

23:12

the details of the

23:14

virology that was done, the viruses that

23:17

were studied under the

23:19

NIH grant, and the

23:21

trouble with that, David, it is

23:23

complicated. And when you try

23:25

to explain it, you get into a lot of

23:28

somewhat arcane virology. But the simple way is that

23:30

it certainly could have come from a

23:33

lab in China. I keep a completely

23:35

open mind. The data

23:37

from evolutionary virologists that don't

23:39

seem to have any skin

23:42

of the game, people from Australia, from

23:44

Canada, from the European Union, from the

23:46

UK, from the United States, feel

23:49

that is much, much more likely that

23:51

it came from the wet market

23:54

because of an animal reservoir jumping.

23:56

That doesn't mean definitive. And they themselves are

23:59

honest and honest. to say it

24:01

isn't definitive, but the evidence

24:03

for that is much, much more strong than

24:06

a quote lab leak. Now, what

24:08

people then do with that, they

24:10

say, ah, you funded a lab in China,

24:13

so that must have been where it came

24:15

from. Well, if you look at the viruses

24:17

that were studied, in order to

24:19

get, first of all, all the intelligence

24:21

agencies uniformly agree

24:24

this was not a

24:26

manufactured virus for bioterror. It must

24:28

have been some sort of an

24:30

accident. Even the ones who think

24:32

it came from a lab say

24:34

that. So then if you look at

24:36

the virus, in order to get a virus

24:38

to do what SARS-CoV-2 is doing,

24:41

you have to have a precursor

24:43

virus that's close enough to

24:45

the virus that you're dealing with to

24:48

be able to say it came from them. But

24:50

if you look at the viruses that were studied, under

24:53

the NIH grant, they

24:56

were evolutionarily so far

24:58

removed as a precursor

25:00

that they could not possibly

25:02

have turned into SARS-CoV-2, even

25:05

if they tried to. Now,

25:07

having said that, does that mean that there

25:09

isn't a lab somewhere in China that we

25:12

don't know about that were doing things that

25:14

led to this? Absolutely.

25:16

That's the reason why I keep an

25:18

open mind that it's one or

25:21

the other, even though I

25:23

feel based on scientific evidence that it's more

25:25

likely a natural occurrence. But this whole debate

25:28

must strike a nerve with you because you

25:30

do spend a lot of time talking about

25:32

it in the book, and it's one of

25:34

these things that has been weaponized

25:38

in the campaign against you. Yeah,

25:41

well, David, the reason I tried

25:44

to put it in language that

25:46

the person who's not a scientist can

25:49

understand, the reason I

25:51

devoted several pages to that, because

25:54

the social media go crazy,

25:56

you know, with accusations that

25:58

are completely preposterous. And

26:01

then would you have a senator of

26:03

the United States of America saying

26:05

publicly on C-SPAN that you're

26:07

running away from the responsibility of the death

26:10

of 4 million people? I

26:12

mean, come on, folks. I

26:14

mean, that was really—I don't

26:16

even want to say any more about that, David. Now,

26:19

this was—was this Rand Paul or— Yes,

26:21

yes. Mm-hmm, yeah. Yeah,

26:23

yeah. You've had your clashes with

26:25

him. One of them

26:27

was early on over masking,

26:29

which he said had no

26:32

scientific basis. Talk a

26:34

little bit about that. Yeah, he's wrong. I

26:36

don't want to get into any details. I

26:38

have no—I don't have any

26:40

antipathy towards nor do I have

26:42

anything against Senator Paul, though

26:45

he obviously— Really? You should.

26:47

I mean, I can't believe you don't. Well, you know,

26:49

I try to keep personal things out of it and

26:51

just do my job. He clearly doesn't like me, that's

26:53

for sure, you know? But

26:56

you know, it is what it is. But

26:58

he says things that are—that, you know, he

27:00

cherry-picks things and comes up to conclusions that

27:03

I think of just incorrect. Yeah, yeah.

27:05

But I guess the bigger question is

27:07

looking forward. The campaign

27:09

against vaccines, the campaign

27:12

against masks, the

27:14

campaign against scientists, are

27:16

you worried that there's a foundation that's been

27:19

laid that is going to make it

27:21

more difficult to subdue the

27:23

next? Yes. The

27:26

next pandemic, and there will be others. Yeah.

27:29

What are the lasting impacts of

27:32

the politicization of these issues? Well,

27:34

David, you've touched on something that's

27:36

extremely important. I

27:39

am more concerned about that

27:41

phenomenon than I am

27:43

about these off-the-wall attacks

27:47

on me as a person,

27:49

because if this disincentivizes

27:51

young people, young, bright

27:54

people from getting into

27:57

public health and public service, then we're going

27:59

to be in a very, very serious to have an

28:01

attenuation of our army

28:04

of defense against the next

28:06

pandemic, which we will inevitably have. We don't

28:08

know when that's going to be, and maybe

28:11

next year, maybe 50 years from

28:13

now. But the idea that

28:15

you essentially lead to

28:18

an erosion of trust in

28:20

science will mean

28:22

that when scientists, based on

28:24

solid information, say we

28:27

should be doing this for the preservation of

28:29

our health, and you have

28:31

a substantial number of people who

28:33

don't believe or listen to that, that's

28:36

going to be detrimental to the health of

28:38

the entire country. And a good example of

28:40

that, David, is what I mentioned

28:42

to you a moment ago, that

28:45

red states have more deaths and

28:47

hospitalizations from COVID than

28:49

do blue states simply because

28:52

they don't get vaccinated. And

28:54

when the president got up after

28:57

the CDC said we

28:59

should be wearing masks indoor, he said, well,

29:01

that's a recommendation. But myself personally, I'm not

29:03

going to do that. He has

29:07

tens of millions of followers.

29:09

So all of a sudden, masks became

29:12

a political issue. And

29:14

you know that. You wear a

29:17

mask, you're against the president, you

29:19

don't wear a mask, you're with the president.

29:22

That's ridiculous. It should have nothing to do

29:24

with what your political ideology is. It have

29:26

to do with what the

29:28

safety is and the

29:31

effect of an intervention to protect

29:33

you. So that's very disturbing. You

29:35

say you're more concerned about that

29:37

and the long term impacts than

29:40

the personal attacks on

29:42

you. But the personal attacks on you

29:44

have been significant. Yeah. And they've changed

29:46

your life and they've impacted on your

29:49

family. Yes. And they

29:51

continue. In fact, you now

29:53

back on the circuit because of

29:55

this book probably raises the threat

29:58

level against you. all

30:00

over again. Talk to me

30:02

about that. We talked about it last time

30:04

we were here, but now you've written about

30:07

it. And I know

30:09

you became somewhat uncharacteristically

30:11

emotional at

30:14

that house hearing about this issue. Tell

30:16

me about your talk to me about

30:18

your wife and particularly your kids and

30:20

how this has affected them. Well, it

30:22

has, and it's disrupted because with all

30:25

of the ability to get

30:27

personal information on

30:30

people. You have these trolls out

30:32

there. I don't know whether they're real people or

30:34

they're bots or they're a combination of both who

30:37

do things that are very intimidating to

30:40

my children, my three daughters, saying

30:43

just a simple sentence, we know

30:45

where you live. Now, just put

30:47

yourself in the place of a young

30:49

woman who's in a city

30:51

alone with their friends and somebody who

30:54

is making threats against your

30:56

entire family and says something like that.

31:01

I try to stay calm and

31:03

collected about threats against me because I made

31:05

the decision to do what I

31:08

did when I made the decision that I had to speak

31:10

up against the president of

31:12

the United States with his tens of millions

31:14

of followers, some of whom stormed

31:16

the Capitol, some of whom done things that

31:19

just astonished me. I can

31:21

handle that, but what angers

31:23

me is the cowardice

31:25

of people that attack

31:27

innocent people, like try

31:30

to intimidate my wife and my

31:32

children. Christine, my

31:34

wife, I believe you may

31:36

have met, is a

31:38

very fee spirit. She just likes to

31:41

do things spontaneously. She's just a wonderful

31:43

person. She refreshes my

31:45

life by that capability of

31:48

spontaneously wanting to do things. The

31:50

spontaneity of things is gone when you

31:52

have to have protection. You just

31:55

can't decide you're going to go out

31:57

for a walk or go up to a bar and have a

31:59

drink. You just can't do that,

32:01

and that has been disruptive to our

32:03

lives. Darrell Bock You describe in the

32:05

book several incidents that were more than

32:08

just idle words or threats. You

32:10

got what was

32:12

feared was an anthrax scare

32:16

in your office. You

32:18

describe – I

32:20

don't want to dwell on the image of

32:22

you standing there naked because you had to

32:24

take all your clothes off after you got

32:26

this letter. That was too much for me.

32:28

But I

32:31

mean, there was a time when

32:33

you and you had to alert your family. I had

32:36

to await the results of

32:38

lab tests to know exactly

32:41

what you were dealing with.

32:43

So these things happened, and

32:47

as you point out, there have been acts

32:49

of political violence in this country

32:52

in recent years that were appalling

32:55

and frightening. I will accept that you

32:57

have taken this on as your mission,

32:59

but when you take this on as

33:01

your mission, it does impact

33:04

on your family, and not just they're

33:06

worrying about themselves, but how about them

33:08

worrying about you? David Albright

33:10

Well, as usual, you hit on

33:12

the right button, David, because

33:15

when I had that

33:17

experience and I was with my

33:19

daughter, one of my daughters happened

33:21

to have been home during that

33:24

waiting period when we were waiting for

33:26

the results from the FBI, whether it

33:28

was ricin or anthrax or just plain

33:30

old powder. That really traumatized

33:32

my children. They were so worried about

33:35

me. They kept on asking me, calling

33:37

me up, are you okay? Do you

33:39

feel well? They were expecting

33:41

that all of a sudden I

33:43

was going to start feeling sick. And

33:45

they were really, I mean,

33:48

to me, that combination

33:51

hurt me, but infuriated

33:53

me to see how frightened

33:55

my children were that I was going to die

33:58

in the next couple of days because... of

34:00

that powder. Well, the fact that

34:02

you have, you know, persistent

34:04

round-the-clock security is

34:07

probably a reminder all the time to them.

34:10

Let's leave the politics aside for

34:12

a second. I want

34:14

to get back to the presidents in a second, but

34:17

what did you learn about the

34:19

public health system through

34:21

this crisis beyond this challenge

34:23

of social media and politics about

34:26

the weaknesses in the system, and

34:28

are you satisfied that we're addressing

34:30

them? I learned a lot

34:33

about the weaknesses. You wrote about that as

34:35

well. I did. I wrote about it, and

34:38

so let me very briefly and succinctly explain.

34:40

I look at it in two separate categories

34:43

of buckets. One is the scientific

34:45

preparedness and response, and

34:47

the other is the public health preparedness and response.

34:49

When you talk about the

34:51

scientific preparedness and response, we get an

34:53

A plus because the

34:56

investment over decades, bipartisan

34:58

investment in basic and

35:00

clinical research led to our capability

35:03

of being able to get a vaccine in

35:06

an unimaginably short period of time,

35:08

11 months. So we should

35:11

explain that the foundation, the

35:13

basic science foundation, put

35:15

these researchers working on this

35:18

particular project way ahead of the game because

35:20

of years and years of government-funded

35:23

research. Exactly. And I remember

35:25

that I describe in the

35:27

book is that the sequence

35:29

of the virus was on a public

35:31

database on January 10th, and my

35:33

team, my vaccine team that developed

35:36

what we call the immunogen or the

35:38

business end of the

35:41

vaccine, whereas others developed the mRNA,

35:43

but that was also with government-funded

35:45

research. They said, just get me

35:47

the sequence and we'll start a

35:49

vaccine in a few days. We'll

35:51

start working on it. And

35:53

we did, and that together with the enormous amount

35:56

of money that was invested in Operation

35:58

Warp Speed had us do... something

36:00

that literally saved, not only saved

36:03

millions of lives for those

36:05

who received the vaccine, but just think of

36:07

what would have happened if it

36:09

had taken five years to develop the

36:11

vaccine, how many deaths there would have

36:14

been worldwide. So we did well then.

36:16

Where we did not do as well-

36:18

Let me just interrupt and say we

36:20

should point out in fairness that for

36:22

all of the disruptive efforts of the

36:24

president who was worried about his reelection

36:26

and wanted to will the virus away

36:28

and propagated all kinds of strange

36:31

theories about how to deal with

36:33

it before the vaccine came. This

36:35

happened under his administration. He did-

36:37

Absolutely. Greenlight this. And he

36:40

deserves all the credit for that,

36:42

that he did. The problem is he doesn't want

36:44

to even admit it anymore now because once he

36:46

mentioned the vaccine at a rally and he got

36:48

booed- Yeah, I saw. Yeah. And I think that

36:50

was the last time you mentioned anything about

36:53

vaccine, which is unfortunate. But anyway, getting

36:55

back to the other bucket, the public

36:57

health bucket, we really have

36:59

a long way to go on that. And

37:01

thank goodness, the CDC, which

37:04

is staffed

37:06

by really terrific people, they

37:08

have a system there that in

37:11

their interaction with the local public health

37:14

is somewhat fragmented, unlike other

37:16

countries where the

37:19

public health system is

37:21

very intimately linked with the primary

37:23

care system. So you know in

37:25

real time what's going on with

37:28

a disease, it goes

37:30

into a computer and you know

37:32

tomorrow what happened today. Whereas

37:35

in our system, the

37:37

states can give information

37:39

or not to the CDC

37:43

on time or not. And

37:45

when the CDC did a

37:47

self-examination, they made a

37:50

bunch of recommendations, which I hope get

37:52

adhered to because we need to do a

37:54

better job of that if

37:57

we want to respond better. So the public

37:59

health arena need some

38:01

significant improvement. Yeah, I

38:03

mean that seems, every time I speak

38:05

to public health experts, they

38:08

point to the fragmentation of

38:10

the system as a real failing.

38:13

You know, you mentioned earlier the value

38:15

of research. That's

38:17

another concern I

38:19

have is that funding continue

38:22

for such research and that

38:24

our investment in these things

38:26

continue. Are you confident of

38:28

that given all the other budgetary pressures

38:30

in politics? No, I'm not confident in

38:33

that because, you know, we're already talking,

38:35

I'm hearing not rumors but statements

38:38

that they want to cut or

38:41

limit the funding of NIH. They want

38:43

to put more constraints on

38:45

research, which I understand if they're reasonable

38:48

things. I mean, I'm not against accountability

38:51

at all. And I

38:53

think some of the suggestions are good suggestions,

38:55

but you don't want to

38:57

have a situation where you hamper

38:59

the conduct of research that

39:02

has led to those discoveries, which we

39:04

know now as a fact, looking back,

39:07

as resulted in the saving of millions and

39:09

millions of lives. Yeah, I

39:11

also, I worry

39:13

about the folks around President Trump

39:16

have suggested that if he's returned

39:18

to office, they want to centralize

39:20

control over all

39:23

agencies more tightly under the president,

39:25

not just the Department of Justice,

39:27

but all regulatory agencies, and that

39:29

would include the FDA, that would

39:31

include the CDC, I trust. That

39:34

has to be a source of concern

39:36

to you if political people are making

39:38

judgments based

39:41

not on the science, but on

39:43

the politics. That,

39:45

David, is the beauty of

39:48

the extraordinary accomplishments of the

39:50

CDC, the NIH, and the

39:52

FDA over decades and decades,

39:55

is the fact that they're free of

39:57

political interference. And it's

39:59

people coming into science and coming into

40:02

the regulatory arena, knowing that

40:04

they can do the right thing and make

40:06

a decision based on the

40:08

best science, not looking over their

40:10

shoulder, knowing if they

40:13

happen to disturb somebody by

40:15

a decision they could immediately be

40:17

kicked out. And that was one of the

40:19

reasons why this idea of

40:21

doing away with the civil service, so that

40:24

if you don't like someone for any reason,

40:26

including political reasons, you can get rid of

40:29

them. I

40:32

hope that never happens, but I

40:34

think that will be a major disincentive for

40:36

the best and the brightest to come into

40:38

those organizations that we need.

40:40

We need an NIH, we need

40:42

a CDC, we need an FDA,

40:45

but we need it with the

40:47

best possible people. We don't need

40:49

it with politically appointed people. The

40:51

best possible people who, as you

40:53

say, feel free to give the

40:55

most unfettered advice as

40:57

to how we should proceed. We're

41:01

gonna take a short break, and we'll be right back

41:03

with more of the Ax Files. And

41:14

now, back to the show. You

41:21

worked for these two presidents.

41:23

You've worked with seven, famously.

41:26

But I wanna focus on this because

41:28

they're running against each other now. One of them will

41:31

be the president on January 20th of 2025.

41:35

Talk about the governing

41:38

styles of Trump

41:40

and Biden as you experienced

41:42

them. You know, David, the one thing

41:44

I wanna make clear to our listeners

41:46

is that when I say

41:48

I'm an advisor to presidents,

41:51

which I was, I wasn't an

41:53

advisor on everything the president did.

41:56

So I was only an advisor in

41:58

the arena of when it came. into

42:00

my lane of public health and science

42:02

and medicine. So I already

42:04

explained, and I explained in the book, that

42:08

when I was dealing

42:10

with President Trump, it

42:13

was very, very clear that he wanted so

42:15

badly for the outbreak to go away that

42:17

he started to say things that were not

42:19

true. And that was when I put me

42:21

in conflict with him and his team. When

42:24

the President, when President Biden, asked me

42:26

to be his chief medical advisor very,

42:28

very soon after he was

42:30

elected, I obviously

42:33

took the job I had known President

42:35

Biden for the eight years that he

42:37

was Vice President because he was in

42:40

a lot of those Situation

42:42

Room discussions

42:44

about Ebola and Zika and

42:46

pandemic flu with President

42:48

Obama. So I got to know him

42:51

and his style better. And

42:54

what became clear that nothing changed, that

42:56

he is driven by

42:58

integrity and by empathy. And

43:01

when we talk about what's

43:03

going on in a pandemic, and remember,

43:06

I'm talking only about health, I'm not

43:08

talking about any other political issues. He

43:11

cares very much about

43:13

the effects of this outbreak on people, even

43:15

though there are other considerations,

43:18

the primary consideration is really the health

43:20

of the people. That was clear to

43:22

me. I guess implicit

43:24

in that is that that

43:26

is a differentiator in

43:28

your mind. In your conversations with

43:31

President Trump, because the reason you're

43:33

an important person to talk to

43:35

about this is you were dealing

43:37

with the same crisis under two

43:39

different presidents. So that gives

43:41

you an apples to apples comparison. How

43:44

much did Trump inquire about the

43:46

impact on people? And how much

43:48

empathy did you see in his

43:51

judgments about that virus? Yeah, again,

43:53

I'm going to say this with

43:55

the caveat that this is not

43:57

a political statement because I keep

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