Dr. Anthony Fauci gave Sen. Rand Paul a stern dressing-down Tuesday morning, telling the Kentucky Republican that he was misinterpreting information in a scientific paper to accuse the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases funding controversial coronavirus research.<\/p>\n
\u201cSenator Paul, you do not know what you are talking about, quite frankly, and I want to say that officially. You do not know what you are talking about, OK?\u201d said Fauci, who has helmed the NIH for more than 35 years.<\/p>\n
The heated response came during a Select Subcommittee on Coronavirus Crisis hearing \u2015 the site of Fauci\u2019s last verbal clash with the conservative senator. In May, the nation\u2019s top expert on infectious disease told Paul he was \u201centirely and completely incorrect\u201d on the origins of the virus that causes COVID-19.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Paul once again focused his questioning on China\u2019s Wuhan Institute of Virology and the origins of the pandemic, which are still murky.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Paul used a 2017 scientific paper to argue that not only was the Wuhan Institute of Virology conducting controversial \u201cgain of function\u201d research on coronaviruses, but it was doing so with taxpayer funds from the NIAID. \u201cGain of function\u201d refers to research on how viruses could become more transmissible in human beings;\u00a0its scientific value is debated.\u00a0If Paul\u2019s claim were true, and it was determined that the virus somehow originated at the Wuhan lab, it could mean Fauci \u2015 who quickly became a GOP bogeyman in the coronavirus era \u2015 might shoulder some blame for the deadly crisis.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Paul lashed out at Fauci in the hearing, telling him: \u201cYou\u2019re trying to obscure responsibility for 4 million people around the world dying from a pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Republican senator, however, had misinterpreted the scientific paper he held up as evidence, Fauci told him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis paper that you are referring to was judged by qualified staff up and down the chain as not being gain of function,\u201d Fauci stated clearly before being interrupted repeatedly by Paul.<\/p>\n
\u201cI totally resent the lie that you are now propagating, senator,\u201d Fauci said, adding that Paul\u2019s implied accusation was \u201cmolecularly impossible.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI want everyone to understand that if you look at those viruses, and that\u2019s judged by qualified virologists and evolutionary biologists, those viruses are molecularly impossible to result in SARS-CoV-2,\u201d Fauci said.<\/p>\n
He concluded: \u201cYou are implying that what we did was responsible for the deaths of individuals. I totally resent that, and if anybody is lying here, senator, it is you.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Later on Tuesday, Paul used the viral moment to ask for donations. He accused Fauci of \u201clies and obfuscations\u201d in a tweet that included a two-minute video of the senator speaking, with none of Fauci\u2019s response.<\/p>\n
The Wuhan Institute of Virology has drawn international interest because it conducts research on bat coronaviruses in the same Chinese province where COVID-19 was first documented. The virus was initially suspected to have jumped to humans from infected animals at a wildlife market in Wuhan, but that explanation fails to account for the individuals with no connection to the market who caught the virus before it started circulating widely.<\/p>\n
The pandemic\u2019s origins are under investigation by authorities in the United States and by the World Health Organization, but it could be years before a consensus is reached.<\/p>\n