Dr. Anthony Fauci tells NatGeo the U.S. must ensure not only an adequate supply of tests before any potential second wave of coronavirus hits later this year, but also a system for getting tests to those who most need them. Read more:
Anthony “Tony” Fauci has become the scientific face of America’s COVID-19 response, and he says the best evidence shows the virus behind the pandemic was not made in a lab in China.
“Shame on us if we don't have enough tests by the time this so-called return might occur in the fall and winter,” he says, advising that the U.S. needs to make sure we not only have an adequate supply of tests available before a second wave hits, but also a system for getting those tests to the people who most need them.
One reason for his confidence is the “impressive” results being seen now in animals tested with a vaccine candidate made by Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Moderna Therapeutics, which brought it into human trials in a record 42 days. The candidate is what is known as an mRNA vaccine—a drug that uses snippets of a virus’s genetic material—rather than the dead or weakened virus itself—to build the proteins that trigger the body’s protective immune response.
Fauci told National Geographic he’s concerned about states rushing to reopen before their infection rates fall. He also shared how he manages the barrage of new scientific information being released about COVID-19, and how his family and faith keep him going despite his increasingly hectic schedule. We don't necessarily have that challenge with this coronavirus because it's obvious that many people make a very adequate immune response. They clear the virus, and they do well. As we know from the natural history of this disease, the majority of people actually either get well without any symptoms—they're called asymptomatic—or they have minimal symptoms, where they get a fever, some aches, and then they recover.
We at NIAID are either developing or supporting the development of multiple candidates. You want a lot of shots on goal. We want four or five candidates that we put out there all within a reasonable time—maybe June, July, or August—to get them into an advanced trial. The mRNA one is already well into phase one of clinical trials, and we're getting ready to go into phase two and three sometime in the early summer.
The clusters in families, the outbreaks on the Teddy Roosevelt aircraft carrier, the enormous spread on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama harbor—it’s a very, very transmissible virus. Let's assume that we now have enough masks or that you could easily make a cloth covering, as was suggested appropriately by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. I think those are reasonable assumptions. We know that the masks are better in the health-care setting to prevent someone who's infected from coughing and sneezing and infecting people in the environment.
It's like drinking from a fire hydrant. It really is. Fortunately for me, I have a staff of three to four really good people who sift through the papers and when something looks unreasonable or “pie in the sky,” they don't bother me with that. Then when all of these studies come across my desk, I read the title and the abstract. If it looks feasible, I'll put it aside and try and read it. When it's something that they think I should read, they make sure I read it.
One topic in the news lately has been the origins of SAR-CoV-2. Do you believe or is there evidence that the virus was made in the lab in China or accidentally released from a lab in China? Then you superimpose upon that all the press you do—the TV or the radio or the interviews. It's kind of a surrealistic state. I have to wake up in the morning and literally, without being facetious, ask my wife, what day is it?
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