Dr Anthony Fauci has defended remarks made on Tuesday following a hearing of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director was heard calling Mr Marshall “a moron” when the senator questioned if he should have a publicly available financial disclosure form.
Dr Fauci told MSNBC on Wednesday that he was stunned to know “that a sitting United States senator doesn’t realise that my financial statement is public knowledge”.
The infectious diseases expert also clashed with Senator Rand Paul during the hearing, who he accused of politicising the pandemic and “kindling the crazies” with his remarks. Dr Paul has since doubled down on his remarks.
Dr Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Dr Janet Woodcock, acting commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, also appeared before lawmakers to answer questions on the US response to new variants of Covid-19.
The hearing comes as health policymakers say they believe the administration needs an urgent reset in the way it is approaching the new realities of the pandemic, although Dr Fauci has suggested that the US was on the “threshold” of Covid-19 becoming endemic.
At a speech on Tuesday, he said the Omicron variant “with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility, will ultimately find just about everybody”.
