Fauci will step down in December

Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert who led the federal government’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic across two presidential administrations, will step down at the end of this year.

The 81-year-old Fauci, who heads the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said in a statement on Monday that he would leave his government post in December to “pursue the next chapter of my career.”

“It has been the honor of a lifetime to have led the NIAID, an extraordinary institution, for so many years and through so many scientific and public health challenges,” Fauci said. “I am very proud of our many accomplishments. I have worked with — and learned from — countless talented and dedicated people in my own laboratory, at NIAID, at NIH and beyond. To them I express my abiding respect and gratitude.”