Infectious disease expert delivers message of hope to Australians
Опубликованно 25.08.2020 18:10
In his only Australian interview, the internationally renowned doctor says he is confident the coronavirus pandemic and its ongoing devastation will come to an end.
“We’re going to get out of this, guaranteed,” Dr Fauci told Tara Brown in a preview released about the show.
“It’s gonna end in Australia. It’s gonna end all over the world. Because we have the capability of doing it, and it’s up to us.”
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“It’s gonna end in Australia. It’s gonna end all over the world. Because we have the capability of doing it, and it’s up to us,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci in his only Australian interview. Picture: Mandel Ngan/AFP.
Dr Fauci’s message of hope comes as the United States grapples with a virus that is tearing apart the nation.
More than five million people have tested positive, and over 170,000 deaths have been recorded.
Leading public health expert Dr Fauci has served six US presidents, but that hasn’t stopped the White House from undermining its own top infectious disease expert lately.
As cracks began to appear between the President and Dr Fauci, White House officials spoke out anonymously to multiple US media publications, including The Washington Post and NBC News, and questioned the value of Dr Fauci’s advice, going so far as to distribute a list of the times he has been wrong.
Still, Dr Fauci remains a Senior Adviser on President Donald Trump’s coronavirus Task Force, saying it has been his life in recent months.
“I don’t take this lightly. I take this extremely seriously,” he told 60 Minutes.
“It’s completely dominated my entire existence over the last eight months.”
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Anthony Fauci, the United States' top infectious disease specialist, likes to focus on science — but his honest takes on America's failures to get a grip on COVID-19 have brought him into ever greater conflict with President Donald Trump. Picture: Mandel Ngan/AFP.
In an interview with Fox News in July, President Trump said Dr Fauci had “made some mistakes” and labelled the public health expert an “alarmist”.
But Dr Fauci tells 60 Minutes he just wants to get the job done.
“I would counter that by saying that I’m a realist,” he said.
While President Donald Trump has been hyping up the possibility of a pandemic-ending coronavirus vaccine being available before the end of this year, Dr Fauci is not quite as optimistic.
“You’ve got to think of the vaccine as a tool to be able to get the pandemic to no longer be a pandemic, but to be something that’s well controlled,” he said earlier this month.
Dr Fauci has previously said he worries about the “durability” of a coronavirus vaccine, saying if COVID-19 acts like other coronaviruses, it may not provide long-term protection.
Still, he remains “cautiously optimistic” of success, and says that “somewhere towards the end of the year, the beginning of 2021, we will know whether they have a safe and effective vaccine”.
Dr Anthony Fauci’s only Australian interview airs on 60 Minutes this Sunday, on Channel 9
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Infectious disease expert delivers message of hope to Australians