Steven Levy
Bound in a book, Anthony Fauci is finally unbound. For 54 years, the nation’s leading pandemic expert stuck to science and public health policy in his public statements, because he had to. As a federal official—who spent the last 38 of those years as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)—discretion was required when it came to internal conflicts and any criticism of his White House bosses. But having left government in 2022, Doctor Fauci, who was both lionized and vilified as the nation’s spokesperson during the Covid crisis, is free to speak in his own voice about his personal experiences.
In his book, On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service, he does just that, covering his entire career—not only his year fighting both Covid and Donald Trump. Diseases come and go (or at least, in the case of AIDS, come under control), but the constant is a mission-driven Brooklyn-born physician who rose as a bureaucrat but insisted on maintaining a lab and seeing patients. Covid doesn’t make an entrance until page 345 of this 464-page tome.
But just as Covid won’t go away, Fauci’s role in fighting the crisis still makes him a hot-button personality. Two years after he left government, anti-science Republicans are still charging that he misled the nation about masks, lockdowns, and the efficacy of quack treatments. But what is likely a majority of Americans—including those who bought bobbleheads of the 83-year-old doctor—still revere him. No wonder On Call topped the bestseller list.
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