Dr. Anthony Fauci, America's top infectious disease expert and adviser to seven presidents, will retire in December, he announced Monday. It's an occasion to reflect on what Fauci, 81, represents in today's tumultuous political landscape. A mild-mannered man of science who steadfastly refused to let political ideology color the facts of the coronavirus pandemic, he was (and continues to be) a designated pariah for a toxic populist movement that made the crisis worse than it had to be.

In his almost 40 years as head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Fauci provided sober, science-based advice to help administrations of both parties navigate some of the most terrifying epidemics in modern history. Initially criticized by the gay community in the 1980s for the government's slow response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Fauci came to be viewed in the movement as an ally and a bridge to the scientific community. In 2015, he personally suited up to treat Ebola patients — an unusual move for a then-74-year-old agency head who answered directly to presidents, but he said it gave him a better understanding of the dangerous disease.

Does any of this describe an evil man bent on hurting America? That's the bizarre narrative that has encompassed Fauci from the political right during the Trump era. Even when they present their wild rhetoric as being driven by genuine issues — the inevitable missteps in the emergency response to a new and mysterious pandemic; a misrepresented controversy over National Institutes of Health funding of Chinese research — none of it merited the level of vitriol aimed at Fauci. He endured slander from Congress and death threats from then-President Donald Trump's base.

Fauci's real crime was insisting on a fact-based approach to the pandemic when the reelection-obsessed president he served was demanding delusions. Trump didn't want to hear about the necessity of shutdowns and masking policies, without which the million-plus American death toll would surely have been worse.

In a broader sense, Fauci embodied respect for expertise — a concept today's right rejects. The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board, for example, waved Fauci out the door Monday under a headline deriding "the Rule of Experts." It reflects an irrational populist belief that on questions of science, the advice of trained scientists should be given no more weight than that of determined ideologues.

More bombastic trolls, including some in Congress, have reacted to Fauci's coming retirement by accusing him of ruining or costing lives, a false and ironic indictment from a crowd that has undoubtedly done exactly that. Some of them continue today to lambast coronavirus vaccination as the "Fauci ouchie." It's a moniker Fauci should wear with pride as he embarks on whatever's next — and as his successors in science wait patiently for this Trumpian fever to break.

REPRINTED FROM THE ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

Photo credit: FotoshopTofs at Pixabay