- Fauchi says he will be leaving his roles at the NIH and in the Biden Administration in December.
- He said he is not yet retiring and plans to continue his career in public health in other ways.
Dr. Anthony Fauci announced on Monday that he plans to leave his roles in the National Institute of Health and the Biden administration in December, but insisted he is not yet retiring from his decades-long career in public health.
Fauci will be leaving the positions of Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and Chief of the NIAID Laboratory of Immunoregulation, as well as the position of Chief Medical Advisor to President Joe Biden, he said, to "to pursue the next chapter of my career."
"While I am moving on from my current positions, I am not retiring," he said in a statement. "After more than 50 years of government service, I plan to pursue the next phase of my career while I still have so much energy and passion for my field."
"I want to use what I have learned as NIAID Director to continue to advance science and public health and to inspire and mentor the next generation of scientific leaders as they help prepare the world to face future infectious disease threats," he added.
Fauci said that he has worked alongside seven presidential administrations in the US and has worked on combatting "newly emerging and re-emerging infectious disease threats including HIV/AIDS, West Nile virus, the anthrax attacks, pandemic influenza, various bird influenza threats, Ebola and Zika, among others, and, of course, most recently the COVID-19 pandemic."
"Because of Dr. Fauci's many contributions to public health, lives here in the United States and around the world have been saved," President Joe Biden said in a statement Monday.
Biden added that one of his first calls as President-elect was to ask Fauci to serve as Chief Medical Advisor to help deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.
"His commitment to the work is unwavering, and he does it with an unparalleled spirit, energy, and scientific integrity," Biden said.
Biden said he knows the "entire world will continue to benefit from Dr. Fauci's expertise in whatever he does next" and that he has "touched all Americans' lives with his work."
"The United States of America is stronger, more resilient, and healthier because of him," Biden said of Fauci.