Fauci << FOW chee >>, Anthony (1940-…), is an American immunologist. He served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) from 1984 to 2022. An immunologist is a scientist who studies the body’s defenses against disease. The NIAID is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the United States government. In January 2020, Fauci became a leading member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, which was assembled to address a deadly pandemic (global outbreak) of the disease COVID-19. This contagious respiratory disease, which is caused by a coronavirus, appeared in China in late 2019 and soon spread throughout the world.
Anthony Stephen Fauci was born on Dec. 24, 1940, in the Brooklyn borough (district) of New York City. He earned a bachelor’s degree at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1962. In 1966, Fauci earned a Doctor of Medicine degree from Cornell University Medical College in New York City. In 1968, Fauci joined the NIAID’s Laboratory of Clinical Investigation. In 1974, he became head of the Clinical Physiology Section, and he was named chief of the Laboratory of Immunoregulation (the control of immune responses) in 1980.
As the director of the NIAID, Fauci advised multiple U.S. presidents and led efforts to combat such emerging diseases as AIDS, caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV); severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS); swine flu; Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS); Ebola virus disease, and COVID-19. In 2008, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his efforts in fighting HIV and AIDS. The medal is the highest civilian honor awarded by the president of the United States.
