Diary Prequel Package — page 217

ut In any event, now finally Jenny Backus is "putting me out there" with my leading the HHS press conference on August 11 to make the announcement with the Secretary and doing all of the press, i.e. Newshour, CNN Situation Room, front page NY Times, multiple NPR interviews ("All Things Considered" , etc) Washington Post, all print from everywhere, NBC Today Show, CBS Evening and Morning News, MSNBC, NBC Nightly News, etc. Still and amazingly, she did not allow me to comment on the NIH data on the evening of Sept. 9th when the NEJM data from the companies came out since we were scheduled for a Secretarial Press briefing at 1:00 PM Friday. When the press called me on the night of Sept.. 9 and heard that I could comment on the NEJM papers, but not our data, they went nuts saying that the HHS were crazy and that the story is tonight for tomorrow and not tomorrow for the next day. The Editors needed to know whether the NIH data corroborated the company data; otherwise they were reluctant to play it up. Finally, I e-mailed Jenny, Laura Petrou, and Niki Lurie telling how crazy this was. Jenny finally relented and let me call back the print people to tell them only that "our data corroborate the companies' data", without giving details. Jenny is stupid and nuts. She refused to allow me to go on TV until tomorrow afternoon. Wolf Blitzer would have none of this and on his Situation Room evening show on Aug. 9, he called me directly in my office and put me on TV as a phone-in voice interview. I did not know that he was going to do this until a minute before he did. Jenny was pissed. Yet, the next afternoon and evening and on Sept. 12, Jenny let me do everything. There was, however, a big blowup with crazy Jenny who attacked Patty Conrad and others at NIH since she claimed that we were blaming her for not letting Fauci go on the air (Duh!!!! That is the truth; that is what she is doing). She wrote a vicious e-mail saying that she was very angry because we were "throwing her under the bus" with the press since then they will think that she is muzzling me.....which she is. She really is a crazy lady. Also, we got great news on Sept. 11 that the Thai canarypox (ALVAC) + AIDSVAX (gp120) HIV vaccine trial showed a 31% efficacy that was clearly statistically significant. Sept 12 - 17, 2009 -Still an extraordinary amount of attempt to "control messaging about H1N1 on the part of HHS and particularly Jenny Backus. They just have a different philosophy that they control message and a person can only speak about what their official responsibility is, i.e. I cannot talk about trends of disease since this is a CDC issue - the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of. Also, quite insulting to me sine I have been talking broadly about ID issues for 25 years to national press Obama having real trouble selling his health care reform plan. Sept. 17, 2009 - Went to State Department for swearing-in of Eric Goosby as the new head of the Office of Global AIDS Coordinator (PEPFAR+). Took place at 4:00 PM in Franklin Room, presided over by Secretary Hillary Clinton. She recognized me in the audience and made a comment during her official remarks about the great work that I have been doing for so many years with HIV/AIDS. Got a chance to chat with her after the ceremony.