COVID-19 Records

Transcript segment

Baric Transcribed Interview (Redacted), pp.70-71 · baric_ti:utt:00597

Page text: p.70, p.71 · original PDF

Date
2026-04-10 09:00 (day precision)
Type
transcript segment · interview
recipient
Christina Salazar, Harry Kazenoff, David T. Lambeth III, William Henderson, Clark Ervin, Jake Greenberg
speaker
Ralph S. Baric
I think, again, you need to talk to the DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com National Institute of Health, because they're the ones who arranged for this group to be formed through the National Academy and the process involved. Typically, the group that is asking the National Academy to respond to a request from an outside group, people from that outside group will explain on the first day of the meeting what the topic is and why they're interested in it, and that sort of thing.

In context

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  1. 2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open
    The process is, as described to me when I first became a member, very esoteric and difficult to understand. But each section in the National Academy will open up a -- begin the process of thinking about new members to induct into the National Academy for their section. And members will nominate individuals. Those individuals will be presented to that section, in terms of a five-minute review of what they did, why it's significant, and where science would be should they not have existed. So you're looking for people who made DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com significant contributions to science. Then they do straw polls to down-select the most heavily supported individuals. Those are then taken to a larger committee and presented to the entire Academy from all the different sections. That group then ultimately makes the final list for voting, and then they do voting the beginning of April. Like the voting will probably end in the next few days, if it hasn't already ended for this next year's nominees that are being inducted. And then they're announced probably sometime within the next week or two, depending on the Academy. That's the process.
  2. 2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open
    And so your understanding is that was convened by NIH?
  3. 2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open
    No. You're confusing induction into the National Academy of Sciences with sponsored research that the National Academy does for Federal institutions. So the NIH wanted the National Academy to form a group that would review the COVID outbreak. That group will include National Academy members as well as individuals who are not National Academy member but knowledgeable experts in the field.
  4. 2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open
    I guess my question is, why was NIH convening this group? Because the same members, right, Dr. Fauci, Francis Collins were in other groups.
  5. 2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric
    I think, again, you need to talk to the DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com National Institute of Health, because they're the ones who arranged for this group to be formed through the National Academy and the process involved. Typically, the group that is asking the National Academy to respond to a request from an outside group, people from that outside group will explain on the first day of the meeting what the topic is and why they're interested in it, and that sort of thing.
  6. 2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open
    Was it just NIH, or were there other agencies that were involved in calling this meeting?
  7. 2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open
    I wouldn't have paid attention to that.
  8. 2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open
    Were you familiar with the other people that were attending the meeting?
  9. 2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open
    Some of the people, for sure.

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