In the age of Big Players, even science has become politicized. The most recent evidence is contained in Dr. Anthony Fauci’s diary, which was just released by Senator Rand Paul. The diary and related documents give us a shocking picture of Big Players plowing under truth to seek and serve their own political interests.
As we recently wrote in Fortune, Big Players are big because their words and deeds move a whole system. They are insensitive to any disciplinary mechanism in the system, be it profit and loss in a market or peer review in science. In addition, they are discretionary because they are not bound to any simple, understandable rule. They act on judgment, even mood or whim in some cases. Big Players make their words and deeds matter more than underlying fundamentals such as consumer preferences or scientific truth. Fauci’s diary provides no less than a confessional by a Big Player who is reveling in his unchecked powers and celebrity status.
Fauci’s diary includes details on the now-famous conference call of February 1, 2020. There were 12 people on the call, including high-achieving scientists and, crucially, a small group of powerful science administrators. These were the UK’s Chief Scientific Advisor Patrick Vallance, Jeremy Farrar of the private funding behemoth Wellcome Trust, head of the NIH Francis Collins, and, of course, Anthony Fauci.
