Some public health experts and advocacy groups are hailing Dr. Anthony Fauci as a hero following his appearance at a contentious Senate hearing.
Fauci, 85, who served as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for nearly four decades, was questioned for more than three hours about the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic at a July 29 Senate hearing.
The former public health chief invoked his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination in response to every question during the hearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
Still, Fauci faced scathing criticism from Republicans during the hearing. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, who heads the committee, said he plans to schedule a committee vote
next week to push for contempt charges against Fauci.
The infectious disease expert, who retired in 2022, was subpoenaed to testify. Days before the hearing, Paul released more than 1,000 pages of diaries Fauci kept during the pandemic. In them, Fauci wrote, in part, about President Donald Trump, calling him "out of control," a "true embarrassment" and "an idiot."
Democrats have criticized the GOP's grilling of Fauci and come to his defense. It echoes sentiments from several leading medical organizations and public health workers.
Medical organizations, advocacy groups back Fauci over Senate hearing
In a letter to the Senate committee, Stefano Bertuzzi, CEO of the American Society for Microbiology, expressed "unequivocal support" for Fauci.
"His career was built on evidence, intellectual rigor and an unwavering commitment to improving people's lives. That record is documented in the scientific literature, reflected in countless advances in medicine and public health and measured in millions of lives saved," Bertuzzi wrote.
Bertuzzi also called Fauci's scientific research "by all accounts and measures, the gold standard."
Similarly, AVAC, or the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition, said it submitted a letter to the committee ahead of the hearing.
Mitchell Warren, AVAC's executive director, wrote in the letter that the group is "dismayed and disturbed" by Fauci being subpoenaed "in pursuit of questionable allegations."
"We implore the committee to cease its erroneous investigations and harassment of renowned scientists and public servants such as Dr. Fauci, whose career, track-record, and devotion to public health research and development has changed the very course of the HIV epidemic at home and abroad," Warren wrote.
Dr. Georges Benjamin, CEO of the American Public Health Association, told NPR that a hearing like the one involving Fauci, combined with cuts to federal agencies, "all adds up to undermining public health in the U.S."
Health care, public health workers call Fauci a 'national hero'
On social media, many medical and public health professionals praised Fauci's work throughout the pandemic.
Olivia Zarella, a research associate at the Colorado School of Public Health, wrote on Threads that Fauci inspired her to push through 80-hour weeks as a university infection prevention specialist in the early days of the pandemic.
"Dr. Anthony Fauci kept a lot of us going through this time and is a national hero," Zarella wrote. "The behavior towards him throughout and since the pandemic is not only absolutely appalling but a sign of a bigger issue."
Jerome Adams, the U.S. Surgeon General under President Trump's first term, wrote on X that he believes "everything (Fauci) said and did was driven by the best intentions for our country."
"There are plenty of people in Washington, D.C. who say and do things more for themselves than for our country. Tony Fauci is not one of them," he added.
On X, Dr. Irwin Redlener, a public health analyst, called the allegations against Fauci an "ignorant witch hunt."
Redlener, a senior advisor for the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University, also called Fauci "one of America’s most heroic public health scientists who has saved countless lives over his long career."
Of the pandemic response, Redlener said: "Of course mistakes were made. This was science on the run & experts were making their best recommendations based on the information they had at that very moment."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fauci praised as 'hero' by public health experts after Senate hearing
