![\"anthony-fauci\"](\"\/federal\/files\/2018\/05\/anthony-fauci.jpg\")
BU will confer on Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a Doctor of Science\u2014his 44th honorary degree. Photo courtesy of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.<\/em><\/p>\nAnthony S. Fauci<\/a>, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases<\/a>\u00a0(NIAID) at the National Institutes of Health since 1984, is one of the world\u2019s most admired scientist-physicians. He has served under six presidents and led the country through the darkest days of the AIDS pandemic. Fauci was one of the principal architects of the President\u2019s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief,<\/a> a program that has saved millions of lives in the developing world.<\/p>\n On May 20, at BU\u2019s 145th Commencement, the University will confer a Doctor of Science on Fauci.<\/p>\n Even in Washington, D.C., a city of workaholics, Fauci is famous for his 16-hour workdays. In 2008, when President George W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom<\/a>, he noted that Fauci \u201csometimes forgets to stop working.\u201d Bush joked about the notes on Fauci\u2019s windshield from coworkers: \u201cGo home, you\u2019re making me feel guilty.\u201d<\/p>\n And in an age when tweets and angry talk show rants pass for dialogue, Fauci stands out for his communication skills. Whether it involves testifying before Congress about the need for research funding or talking about Ebola on national television, he can make complicated science comprehensible. The goal, he says, is not to appear smart. It is to be understood.<\/p>\n In 1984, when a mysterious plague called AIDS was devastating the gay community and Anthony Fauci was the new NIAID director, he did something that was viewed by the scientific establishment as radical and ill-conceived: he met with AIDS activists. \u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Confronted with a deadly disease that at the time had no treatment, the activists wanted input into the regulatory process around drugs and clinical trials. \u201cMost scientists were afraid of them,\u201d Fauci says. \u201cThey wouldn\u2019t listen to them.\u201d Desperate to be heard, the activists stepped up their demonstrations across the country. They shut down Wall Street, set off smoke bombs on the NIH campus in Bethesda, Md., and hanged Fauci and other health officials in effigy. \u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cThe activists were in great pain\u201d Fauci says. \u201cThey had a disease that was associated with a disenfranchised population\u2014gay men, injection drug users, commercial sex workers. They were saying, \u2018Wait a minute, you\u2019ve got it wrong. We\u2019re going to live an additional few months to a year and a half and you\u2019re talking about a process that\u2019s going to take years. You\u2019ve got to reexamine the paradigm.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n He invited a group of AIDS leaders to meet with him in his office. \u201cNo one had ever spoken to them\u2014forget about inviting them to their office,\u201d he recalls. \u201cThat\u2019s where the dialogue began. It continues to this day.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were misinformed on some things,\u201d Fauci says. \u201cThey were also quite correct on some things that we were misinformed on. Once you sat down and talked to them, it didn\u2019t change the fact that we disagreed on a lot of things, but it transformed hostility into mutual respect. That opened the door to gradually getting our differences ironed out.\u201d<\/p>\n It was \u201cone of the best things I\u2019ve ever done,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Fauci, whose parents were the children of immigrants, grew up in Brooklyn\u2019s Bensonhurst section, in an apartment above his pharmacist father\u2019s drugstore. As a boy, he delivered prescriptions on his bike. He credits his parents\u2014and his Jesuit education, at Regis High School, in New York City and at the College of the Holy Cross, where he earned a bachelor\u2019s degree\u2014with his lifelong interest in public service.<\/p>\n Fauci drapes his honorary degree robes on a coatrack in his office. Photo courtesy of Fauci.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n His parents believed in making a contribution to society and \u201cwere never, ever interested in worldly things,\u201d he recalls. \u201cThey were never concerned at all with money. When I was a kid, it used to get me a little annoyed.\u201d<\/p>\n Fauci speaks passionately of the debt he owes his Jesuit teachers. \u201cPeople say, \u2018Well, so you spent four years in Greek in high school and three years in college and you spent four years in Latin in high school and three years in college\u2014what the hell has that got you?\u2019\u201d he says. \u201c\u2018You can\u2019t speak Latin, you can\u2019t speak Greek.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s not what it\u2019s all about,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s about understanding civilizations. It\u2019s understanding people. It\u2019s understanding the thoughts and philosophy of scholars hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago. That\u2019s the thing that is to me the most valuable thing\u2014understanding humanity.\u201d<\/p>\n As NIAID director, Fauci oversees research to diagnose, prevent, and treat HIV\/AIDS and other infectious diseases, such as malaria, tuberculosis, and Ebola. He is also chief of the NIAID Laboratory of Immunoregulation<\/a>\u2014a field he helped pioneer\u2014where he has made numerous important discoveries related to immune-mediated and infectious diseases. He is a key advisor to the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services on global infectious disease issues. His awards include the National Medal of Science<\/a>, and the Mary Woodard Lasker Award for Public Service, and he serves on the editorial boards of numerous scientific journals, delivers major lectures around the world, and is the author, coauthor, or editor of more than 1,300 scientific publications. A 2017 analysis of Google Search citations ranked him as the 24th most cited researcher of all time.<\/p>\n At 77, Fauci no longer runs marathons, but he says he still logs three or four miles a day. And he carves out time to see patients two days a week.<\/p>\n He continues to meet with AIDS activists. Just recently he invited two longtime activists, Peter Staley and David Barr, to his home for dinner, where they talked about the lack of availability of a drug that helps to prevent HIV infection\u2014and their concerns that AIDS is no longer receiving sufficient attention.<\/p>\n \u201cI cooked them a sausage and rigatoni meal,\u201d \u00a0Fauci says. \u201cWe sat down and had a bottle of wine and spoke until the wee hours of the mornings. It was just like in the 1980s.\u201d<\/p>\n This year\u2019s other BU honorary degree recipients are Commencement speaker and civil rights icon Congressman John Lewis (D-Ga.), Doctor of Laws; Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou<\/a>, Doctor of Humane Letters; San Juan, P.R., mayor and activist Carmen Yul\u00edn Cruz Soto<\/a>\u00a0(CAS\u201984), who will be the Baccalaureate speaker, Doctor of Laws; and filmmaker and journalist Vibha Bakshi (COM\u201993,\u201996), Doctor of Humane Letters.<\/em><\/p>\n Find more information about Commencement here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n![\"honorary](\"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/today\/files\/2018\/05\/anthony-fauci-robes-e1526321447868.jpg\")
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