Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
It’s not every day that the diary of one of the most polarizing figures of a global pandemic gets released to the public. But that’s exactly what happened last month to Dr. Anthony Fauci.
In late July, Senator Rand Paul publicly released over 1,000 pages of notes that Fauci had kept—on a government server—during his time as Covid-19 czar, between 2019 and 2022. Shortly thereafter, Fauci was forced to testify before the Senate, on July 29. Then in early August, Paul and fellow Republican senator Ron Johnson released a set of texts, obtained from Fauci’s government-issued cell phone, between him and other health officials. In the following weeks, the “Fauci Diaries” sparked a new debate over Dr. Fauci’s legacy.
The pages, as well as Fauci’s testimony and subsequently released text messages, revealed an alarming gap between what Fauci told the public and what he told others privately and admitted to himself—about the virus’s possible origins, concerns over vaccine safety for pregnant women, the effectiveness of boosters, the efficacy of school closures, and more.
Dr. Vinay Prasad is a hematologist-oncologist who broke early with conventional wisdom on how to handle the pandemic and later became the FDA's top vaccine regulator. He has also read the Fauci diaries in full, and he’s here to break down every revelation.
It’s not every day that the diary of one of the most polarizing figures of a global pandemic gets released to the public. But that’s exactly what happened last month to Dr. Anthony Fauci.
In late July, Senator Rand Paul publicly released over 1,000 pages of notes that Fauci had kept—on a government server—during his time as Covid-19 czar, between 2019 and 2022. Shortly thereafter, Fauci was forced to testify before the Senate, on July 29. Then in early August, Paul and fellow Republican senator Ron Johnson released a set of texts, obtained from Fauci’s government-issued cell phone, between him and other health officials. In the following weeks, the “Fauci Diaries” sparked a new debate over Dr. Fauci’s legacy.
The pages, as well as Fauci’s testimony and subsequently released text messages, revealed an alarming gap between what Fauci told the public and what he told others privately and admitted to himself—about the virus’s possible origins, concerns over vaccine safety for pregnant women, the effectiveness of boosters, the efficacy of school closures, and more.
Dr. Vinay Prasad is a hematologist-oncologist who broke early with conventional wisdom on how to handle the pandemic and later became the FDA's top vaccine regulator. He has also read the Fauci diaries in full, and he’s here to break down every revelation.
