A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it
answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.
-
Feb. 14, 2013 - Valentine's Day. Very interesting and enjoyable evening. Chris and I were invited by Wayne and Catherine Reynolds to a dinner in the Adams Room of the Hay Adams Hotel to honor Ehud Barak, Defense Minister and former Prime Minister of Israel. He is in the USA for a meeting with Leon Panetta (Secretary of Defense). Great time. Usual A crowd of DC, which this time included David Petraeus and his wife Holly. Had the chance to speak with Petraeus and mentioned that I often said Hi to him as we passed running on the C & O Canal. He said he recognized me, which was probably just being polite. I thanked him for his years of service to the country. He was very gracious. Obviously, some degree of awkwardness in the crowd given the Paula Broadwell scandal and his wife being there on "Valentine's Day". Also present among many other were Bob Barnett and wife, Ed Markey (soon to run for Senator from Massachusetts) and wife Susan Blumenthal, Rick Atkinson (Pulitzer Prize winner author), Lyric Winik and husband Jay, Ben Carson and wife Candy, Josh Bolten and his new girlfriend (?name), Bill Cohen (former Sec. of Defense) and wife Janet, etc. Barak gave a very insightful speech on the challenges facing Israel in the context of the Arab Spring, Syria, and Iran.
-
Feb. 25, 2013 - Still no solution to the impending sequestration deadline of March 1, which will result in across-the-board cuts to Pentagon and discretionary spending (including NIH). The POTUS is doing some severe posturing that this is all the fault of the Republicans and is having all of the Cabinet members out there saying how disastrous the cuts will be. Meanwhile, Bob Woodward points out in an editorial in the Washington Post on Feb. 24 that the POTUS "moved the goal posts" on the GOP by wanting to bring up tax increases even though the original discussions surrounding the budget deal of a few months ago is that the Bush tax cuts were allowed to expire and so taxes are "off the table". Woodward says the POTUS now wants to put them back in play. Looks like sequestration will occur. Sad day in that former Surgeon General C. Everett (Chick) Koop dies at age 96. I had the pleasure of giving the laudatios at his 80th and 90th birthdays. My quotes appeared in many newspapers regarding his amazing life and also on local FOX TV.
-
Mar. 1, 2013 - Sequester kicked in and so spending cuts are in effect. Incredible posturing on part of GOP as well as the POTUS who is stating that the "world will come to an end" and the GOP is to blame since they refuse to raise taxes. This is pitiful government. Also, interesting finding being presented at CROI meeting in Atlanta in a couple of days of an infant who was treated (not prophylaxed) with ARVS within 30 hours of birth since his mother who was infected had no anti-natal care and obviously no ARVs. She presented in an ER in Mississippi at labor. The physicians felt that since the risk was so high for the baby that they treated the infant before the tests for HIV came back. They usually take several days to come back. Right choice. The baby was infected and stayed on ARVs for 18 months. Then lost to follow up and mother D/C'd the ARVs for 10 months and reappeared. Only now the baby is well and no evidence of replicating virus (some probably dead residual DNA by PCR. Also, immune response to HIV disappeared (not surprising in the absence of persistent virus). This may be the first real case of a cure, not the "Berlin Patient" whom I always thought was totally non-feasible for scale up and danger. Of note, I have been saying for years that the best bet for a cure was to treat as early as possible to prevent establishment of a large reservoir and to prevent destruction of immune system by persistent viral replication over months to years. The best scenario for this is to treat a child at birth. Perhaps there are other children on therapy who received ARVs relatively early (not necessarily within hours) who are in fact cured and do not know it. Much study to be done.
-
Mar. 4, 2013 - The media interest in the "cured" baby has been as intense or more than anything I have experienced here at NIH. Yesterday I did WUSA 9 nightly news and today I did: CBS Morning News with Charlie Rose and Nora O'Donnell; WTOP Radio; Fax Morning News; CBS Radio LA; Fox Radio News; NBC News and NBC Nightly News; ABC Evening News; BBC World Service Radio; Canadian Broadcast (CBC) TV; CNN International with Christianne Amanpour; CNN Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer; WLS radio; PBS NewsHour with Ray Suarez; BBC Radio; Canada CNN Radio; CNN Anderson Cooper 360; Al Jazeera. Quite a day. I stressed that we must be careful since this is only a single case in very unusual circumstances. All media went very well.
-
2013-03-05 00:00
Anthony S. Fauci
Mar. 5, 2013 - Media frenzy continues. I have now gone over the data from the Hannah Gay and Persaud presentation at CROI and I have some doubts that the child was ever truly infected in the first place. Tough to really tell whether the virus that was detected and ultimately disappeared on ARVs was the virus from the mother or really infected baby cells making virus. The authors claim that the 2 phase decay of virus on ARVs is characteristic of the response to active virus replication. Cliff Lane pointed out that the decay curve has very few points and is also compatible with a single phase decay. In any event, I have been taking the conservative approach of emphasizing that this is just a single case and it needs to be replicated and validated and importantly, it has little to do with infection in the adult where reservoirs are firmly established prior to the start of ARVs. Nonetheless, the media frenzy continues with interview for Men's health, Huffington Post, NPR- San Francisco (KQED), Boston Globe. riedel of Senate ie for tomorrow
-
Mar. 6, 2013 - When it rains, it pours. CDC came out with a "Vital Signs" alert out of MMWR about the growing threat of Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriacea (CRE), which includes Klebsiella pneumonia carbapenem-resistant (KPC) that gave the NIH Clinical Center the outbreak of 18 cases (11 deaths, 7 of which were due to the KPC) in 2011. Another media frenzy starts with me on NBC Nightly News X2.
-
Mar. 7, 2013 - CRE media with Diane Rehm Show, Briefed Laura Friedel of Senate Minority Staff at Appropriations (Staffer to Ron Moran)
-
Mar. 8, 2013 - Guest on Geraldo Rivera Show for "cure" baby; CNN tape for tomorrow on CRE; the Washington Post "The Fold" (online TV) on HIV.
-
Mar. 11, 2013 - Flew to Boston for the day to give Keynote Lecture at the dedication of the new building for the Ragon Institute of MGH, Harvard, and MIT. Held at 400 Technology Square in Cambridge, MA. Orchestrated by Bruce Walker who is amazing at raising money for his biomedical research. Terry and Susan Ragon (software billionaires) gave Bruce $10 million per year for 10 years and now an additional $30 million to renovate the building for the Ragon Institute. I spent a few hours interacting with the Ragon scientists, gave my Keynote and then had dinner at the "Catalyst" restaurant in Cambridge. Many Boston scientific and other luminaries at lecture and dinner including Bob Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, and his family (wife and son Jonathan). Also at lecture and at dinner and with whom I had great conversations were Drew Faust (President of Harvard), Raphael Reif (President of MIT), Ray Slavin (President of MGH) among others. We discussed the potential effects of the "sequestration" Very nice visit.