Dr. Anthony Fauci, who turns 82 on Saturday, wants the record to reflect that he is not retiring. Really, he isn’t. It’s just that after 54 years as a government scientist and adviser to seven presidents, he is leaving the National Institutes of Health at the end of the year.
The nation’s top infectious disease doctor insists he still wants to write, make public appearances and continue to shape research on infectious diseases. So he will continue to be a presence in the lives of his many fans — and his equally zealous detractors.
As Fauci tells it in his distinctive Brooklyn accent, he drove onto the NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland, in June 1968, a 27-year-old physician fresh out of residency training. He burrowed into the burgeoning field of immunology and was well situated to help identify the source of a mysterious illness afflicting gay men in the early 1980s.
