Top US infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci is hinting at retirement as cases of COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations remain low.
“I have said that I would stay in what I’m doing until we get out of the pandemic phase, and I think we might be there already,” Fauci told ABC’s “Start Here” podcast.
“I can’t stay at this job forever. Unless my staff is going to find me slumped over my desk one day; I’d rather not do that,” he added,
The 81-year-old Fauci’s remarks come as he’s under fire from conservative lawmakers who feel the pandemic restrictions he’s pushed have gone too far.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has said he plans to push an amendment to remove Fauci as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases — saying no one should be “dictator in chief.”
Paul (R-Ky.), who has often feuded with Fauci at Senate hearings over the administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, wrote in an op-ed on Fox News that American ”lives were held captive by petty tyrants and power-hungry bureaucrats” over the past two years.