A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it
answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.
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August 31, 2012 - Slow month of August in D.C. Summer. On Aug. 8, 2012 did a "Science in the Cinema" performance at the AFI Theater in Silver Spring with Ian Lipkin for the movie "Contagion". Fun being with Ian. Always a character. Problem over past 2 weeks with the PR associated with Klebsiella pneumonia - carbapenam-resistant organism (KPC) in the NIH Clinical Center. The Clinical Center (CC) and NHGRI people published a paper in Science Translational Medicine on the genetic analysis by deep sequencing of a KPC the originated from an index case in the CC and then infected spread by people or fomites to 17 other people in the CC - 11 deaths - 6 from KPC bacteremia. The PR people at CC did not handle it well. They got so absorbed in the science of the paper that they did not realize that the community reaction would be "Why did not anyone tell us about this outbreak - even though there was no actionable information here since the organism does not bother healthy people and the man-on-Wisconsin Avenue is at no risk. Aug 15 to 25, I had bad URI with fever and malaise that took 2 weeks to resolve. Over the past few weeks, I have become enamored/obsessed with the Washington Nations baseball team. I feel like I felt when I was 12 years old and knew the batting averages of all of the N.Y. Yankees. The Nats are 7 1⁄2 games in first place and they have the best pitching staff in baseball - Steve Strasburg, Gio Gonzales, Jordan Zimmerman, Ross Detwiler, Erwin Rodriguez. There hitters are amazing. Bryce Harper (19 years old) is pounding the ball and he runs and throws and fields like Mickey Mantle. Also, Jason Werth, Adam La Roche, Ryan Zimmerman, Michael Morse, Ian Desmond, Danny Espinoza - all very good hitters.
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Sept. 7, 2012 - As part of the kick-off of the "Celebration of Science" weekend here in D.C. and at NIH sponsored by Michael Milken, I was on a 2 man panel run by Greg Simon, formerly of Faster Cures". The panel (filmed for TV) was on the science and real world of HIV/AIDS. My co-panelist was Magic Johnson. It was a fun experience. He is a wonderful guy with an amazingly infectious smile. He commented to the audience during the panel that he wanted to go on a "road show" with me since I explain "stuff" so well. He said that I "...really get it and can speak to the common man". We spoke about basketball and baseball. We spoke about our children. His son is at NYU, and loves NYC as do Jenny and Megan. He has another son who works for him in his Company/Foundation. His daughter is a High School student in L.A. He is part-owner of the L.A. Dodgers and we spoke about how good the Washington Nationals are this year (see above).
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Sept 8-12, 2012 - The past few days have been very intense, but exciting. Following the Celebration of Science meeting in Washington DC, I immediately went up to Boston to deliver the opening plenary lecture at the 2012 AIDS vaccine meeting. It was extremely well received. Following my talk Gov. Deval Patrick got up and welcomed the audience to Boston and made the comment that it was an honor to be on the same stage with Dr. Tony Fauci and the thanked me for my service to the country. Over the past few days that has been continued activity concerning the dual use research of concern issue particularly regarding highly pathogenic H5N1 influenza virus. I had a conversation with Heidi Avery of the National Security Staff on September 12 during which she encouraged me to continue to try and find the right balance between safety and security as well as the benefits of doing such research. Heidi has always been a very good friend to me and she informs me that she will be leaving the national security staff to go back to her major post at the CIA. We have a major meeting coming up in December, 2012 to discuss the moratorium on H5N1 research. This should be an important meeting to set general principles of the types of research that should or should not be done. I have really enjoyed working with Heidi over the past few years.
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Sept. 12, 2012 - Conversations with Heidi Avery continued - Heidi called my office when I was out running on an absolutely beautiful September day. My office contacted me and I came up to office and called Heidi with my running clothes on. Bottom line is that Heidi re-confirmed her strong feeling that the NSABB or any other advisory body should not be dictating to the USG what we can or cannot do, particularly when it comes to national security. She wanted to emphasize that she does not want NSABB making any pronouncements about the general "straw man" principles about what H5N1 influenza research should or should not be done. When I explained to her how the NSABB (which is scheduled to meet in October) was insistent that they determine the principles, Heidi was adamant. She finally said (in good spirits since we are good friends) that no way did she want any pronouncement about the general principles about conducting research (particularly from Mike Osterholm - she has his number) from the NSABB BEFORE THE NOV. 6 ELECTION. I told her that I understood. This will really be dicey since we have to figure out a way out of the October NSABB meeting and/or a way to get them off this subject. Heidi also confided in me that Leon Panetta really wanted her back at CIA for a "special assignment" (remember, she was counterterrorism before coming to NSS). Also, I finally told Heidi that there is definitely a direct leak from IPC (likely Kris Beardsley) to Mike Osterholm. Heidi said she knew this all along and she knows exactly who it is, although I am not entirely certain. More later, since we now have to decide whether to cancel the October NSABB meeting which will cause an uproar among some of them or take the chance of their coming up with something that Heidi does not want to see happen.
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2012-09-15 00:00
Anthony S. Fauci
Sept. 15, 2012 - Exceptionally pleasant and enjoyable evening. Bob and Deborah Seder invited Chris and me to join them for the Bruce Springsteen concert at Nationals Stadium. He arranged an amazing group of 10 people for the event. It included Bob Woodward and his wife Elsa Walsh, a couple Christen (executive director of the Four Seasons Hotel in DC) and his wife Meg (? last name), Bob (very wealthy entrepreneur) and wife Alison (? Last name) Bob and Deborah, Chris and me. We met at Café Milano and had a great meal; a van took us to Nat's Stadium and back. The concert was truly amazing. Springsteen and his E Street band gave the best musical performance that I have ever experienced. We had seats on the infield right in front of the stage that was set up on where the outfield is for baseball games. However, we did not sit since everyone was standing. Springsteen played for 3 hours and 45 minutes without stopping for a minute. He went from one song to another. The crowd absolutely loved it. It was a beautiful "Indian Summer" evening at around 70 degrees. Got to know Bob Woodward with prolonged conversations about what I do and what he does. He feels passionate about what he wrote in his latest book (came out this week) entitled "The Price of Politics". He is a good guy and it was fun getting to know him.
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Sept. 18, 2012 - Pleasant surprise. Received an inscribed copy of Bob Woodward's new book "The Price of Politics" with a note written in the first page - "To Tony Fauci and Christine Grady - What a great night it was! - With greatest regards, Bob Woodward".
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Sept. 19, 2012 - Received "The Starlight Award" together with Roy Vagelos from the Children's Inn at NIH. I received it for the "Science" and Roy for his extraordinary influence on building of the Inn in 1990 with Merck money when he was at the time the CEO of Merck. Ceremony held at the Liaison Hotel at 415 New Jersey Avenue, N.W. Many notables from Congress and entertainment at the event. To name a few: Congressmen Chris van Hollen, John Dingle, Barney Frank, Doris Matsui; Sens. Frank Lautenberg, Roy Blunt; TV Anchor Gordon Peterson. MC was Cokie Roberts. Twentyeight year old former AIDS patient Hydeia Broadbent gave speech and I was praised for helping to develop the drugs that saved her life when she came to the Inn and NIH at age 6 years old with advanced AIDS and now she is healthy and happy - many tears in the audience.
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Sept. 25, 2012 - Meeting in the Situation Room of the White House (1:30 to 3:00 PM) called by Heidi Avery. Discussed the issues around DURC and how we are going to address the voluntary (on the part of the scientists) moratorium on gain-of-function for transmissibility in mammals research on highly pathogenic avian H5N1 influenza. We (ASF, May Patterson, Francis Collins, Larry Tabak and the HHS crew led by Sally Howard, Chief-of-Staff to Sebelius and Bill Corr, Deputy Secretary, HHS) have been working for several weeks on a meeting-working group-consultation (to take place hopefully in December, 2012) to develop principles for making decisions regarding funding (mostly by HHS) for these types of H5N1 experiments. These principles could then serve as the basis for guidelines for DURC that go well beyond H5N1. The Europeans (mostly the Dutch with Ron Fouchier) want to end the moratorium now. I have written a commentary to appear soon in mBio (online Journal of the ASM) that asks for keeping the moratorium on H5N1 gain-of-function until the abovementioned December meeting. The NSABB people, particularly Mike Osterholm, Mike Imperiale, and David Relman are continuing their somewhat hysterical comments in and out of the press about how dangerous these experiments are and how they should never be performed. Heidi is adamant that they could be very important to do these experiments for the national security and she does not tolerate any "advisory group" such as NSABB dictating to the USG what it can or cannot do in the line of National Security. I love Heidi; she is a tough CIA operative and unfortunately for us will return to the CIA soon. She confided this to me a week or so ago. Apparently, Leon Panetta has some important, secret assignment for her. As always, she e-mails me or calls me after an important White House meeting to get my take on it. I am inserting below an e-mail she sent me (10:15 PM - Sept. 25, 2012) the evening after the White House meeting: Tony, Just to say thank you for your time today, along with your NIH colleagues. I am very sorry for how tedious parts of the discussion became. We were not all on the same page before the meeting. Hopefully you agree we identified a path forward. I will not be around to see this through, but very much hope success is achieved in terms of HHS guidelines enabling researchers to be comfortable moving forward with this important work. Really is a national security imperative. Best regards, Heidi
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Sept. 27, 2012 - Attended World Leaders Forum at the Low Library at Columbia University. On a panel with Wafaa El-Sadr, Eric Goosby and Michel Sidibe (Director, UNAIDS). Very enjoyable. Jenny attended. Discussed the potential end of AIDS.