Fauci’s $1.19 Per COVID Death: Inside the Cash Awards, Government Assistance and Private Diaries of America’s Pandemic Celebrity

While Americans buried loved ones, lost businesses and watched their children fall behind, records show Dr. Anthony Fauci actively participated in pursuing prestigious awards—including cash prizes that paid him more than $912,000.

By Steven Tauriello Freedom News Media

More than 766,000 Americans died with COVID-19 recorded as the underlying cause of death during 2020 and 2021.

Schools closed. Businesses were ordered shut. Children sat in front of computer screens instead of teachers. Parents lost jobs. Families were separated from dying relatives. Weddings, funerals, church services and ordinary human interaction were restricted in the name of public health.

Meanwhile, Dr. Anthony Fauci—the most recognizable face of America’s pandemic response—personally received at least $912,460 in documented cash-award proceeds.

That works out to approximately:

$1.19 in cash awards for every American COVID death in 2020 and 2021.

To be absolutely clear, Fauci was not literally paid according to the number of people who died. The $1.19 figure is a mathematical comparison, not evidence that the awards caused any deaths or that Fauci profited directly from individual fatalities.

But it is a comparison Americans have every right to consider.

The deeper story is not simply that a famous scientist won an award. Newly released records show Fauci did not always sit passively while independent organizations discovered and honored his work. He discussed potential prizes with associates, supplied material supporting nominations and relied upon employees inside his federal office to help prepare, process and publicize awards that could provide him with enormous personal financial benefits.

The question is no longer merely whether accepting the money was technically permitted.

The question is whether one of the most powerful public officials in America exercised ethical judgment worthy of the authority and trust placed in him.

A $899,960 deposit

The largest known payment came from the 2021 Dan David Prize, an international award nominally valued at $1 million.

The prize required 10 percent of its value to be used for scholarships. In a March 2022 email correcting his annual financial disclosure, Fauci stated:

“The Dan David prize that was deposited in my bank account was $899,960.00.”

The statement appears in the award-document package released by Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rand Paul.

Fauci also reported personally receiving $12,500 from the Elliot Richardson Prize after the other half of its $25,000 value was automatically directed to charity.

Together, the two documented personal payments total:

$912,460

There is no evidence that Fauci personally accepted every cash component associated with every honor he received. Federal ethics officials prevented him from accepting money attached to certain awards involving institutions with funding relationships to NIAID.

But the Dan David payment was approved, processed and ultimately deposited into Fauci’s bank account.

Fauci did not merely wait for awards to find him

Defenders may argue that Fauci had spent decades working in infectious-disease research and was naturally recognized during the largest public-health emergency in generations.

His career was unquestionably long and influential.

But the released correspondence challenges the image of an entirely passive award recipient.

In communications with longtime scientific associate Dr. Barton Haynes, Fauci discussed awards for which he could potentially be nominated. In one exchange, after discussing a Shaw Prize nomination, Fauci raised another opportunity:

“There is another one that looks possible for me. It is the Dan David Prize.”

Fauci indicated that he would supply the necessary material.

The distinction matters.

An unsolicited award is one thing. Identifying a lucrative prize, approaching an eligible nominator and helping furnish the case for why you should receive it is something else entirely.

That does not prove fraud. It does not prove bribery. It does not mean Fauci controlled the final selection committee.

It does show ambition—and a willingness to participate actively in obtaining recognition that could result in substantial personal payment.

The colleagues who helped

Dr. Barton Haynes

Haynes, a prominent Duke University researcher and longtime Fauci associate, participated in discussions involving several possible award nominations, including the Shaw Prize, Heinz Award and Dan David Prize.

Correspondence shows Fauci asking about nomination requirements and offering to provide the supporting materials.

Haynes and institutions connected to his research had extensive relationships with NIAID funding. Recent reporting has raised questions about millions of dollars in subsequent NIAID support received by scientists who helped nominate Fauci for lucrative prizes. A funding relationship deserves examination, but it does not, by itself, prove an exchange of federal grants for personal nomination assistance.

To establish a quid pro quo, investigators would need evidence that Fauci approved, increased or protected a specific grant because a scientist nominated him.

The released material reviewed so far has not established that.

Dr. Charles Dinarello

Dr. Charles Dinarello formally submitted the successful Dan David nomination.

In correspondence included in the award release, Dinarello reportedly thanked Fauci and NIAID Chief of Staff Greg Folkers for doing “most of the work” involved in the nomination.

That is significant.

The formal nominator may have submitted the application, but the nominee and personnel inside his federal office appear to have played substantial roles in building it.

Greg Folkers

Folkers served as Fauci’s chief of staff at NIAID.

A November 2020 email shows Folkers working on the Dan David submission and seeking language from other NIAID employees to strengthen—or “beef up”—the COVID portion of the nomination.

The timing cannot be ignored.

The work was occurring in November 2020, while COVID deaths were rising, businesses were struggling under restrictions and millions of children remained outside normal classrooms.

Federal employees were not merely arranging a ceremony after Fauci had unexpectedly won. They were helping build the argument for why their boss should receive the award.

Other NIAID personnel

Additional NIAID employees assisted with various aspects of the awards process, including:

• Developing nomination language
• Gathering descriptions of NIAID’s COVID response
• Preparing biographical and professional materials
• Coordinating ethics approval
• Communicating with award organizers
• Managing media and public-relations matters
• Supplying identification and banking-related information
• Correcting financial-disclosure records

The government’s ethics review concluded that Fauci could accept the Dan David payment because it was treated as a legitimate award from an independent private foundation.

That resolves one narrow question: whether existing federal rules allowed him to accept it.

It does not fully resolve another:

Should taxpayer-funded employees be used to pursue and administer a private award worth nearly $900,000 to their boss?

Fauci’s government compensation

Fauci was not the director of the entire National Institutes of Health, as he is sometimes described.

He was director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, an institute within NIH, from 1984 until his retirement in December 2022. During the Biden administration, he also served as the president’s chief medical adviser.

His reported federal salaries during the central pandemic years were:

Fauci’s 2020 compensation made him the highest-paid federal employee reported at the time, earning more than the statutory $400,000 presidential salary. His elevated compensation was allowed through special federal authorities designed to provide competitive pay for government physicians and scientists.

Combining his reported federal salary from 2020 through 2022 with the two identified personal cash-award payments produces approximately:

$2,283,454

That total is not Fauci’s net income after taxes. It does not include the value of health insurance, leave, retirement contributions, investment income, his wife’s earnings or any income earned after leaving government.

Outside watchdog OpenTheBooks estimated that Fauci’s annual federal pension could eventually approach or exceed $400,000. That remains an outside projection rather than a publicly released, official individual pension statement from the federal government.

What Americans were enduring

More than 766,000 deaths

Final CDC data list COVID-19 as the underlying cause in:

• 350,831 deaths during 2020
• 415,399 deaths during 2021
• 766,230 deaths combined

Earlier provisional totals differ slightly, which is why articles must identify exactly which measurement they use. The figures above are based on finalized or later CDC underlying-cause data, rather than counting every death certificate on which COVID appeared as any contributing factor.

Dividing Fauci’s identified $912,460 in cash-award proceeds by 766,230 deaths produces approximately $1.19 per death.

Again, this is a symbolic comparison—not an allegation that Fauci was compensated for fatalities.

It illustrates the extraordinary contrast between the suffering experienced by the country and the personal recognition being pursued and received by the official most closely identified with the government response.

Schools closed across America

At the peak of the spring 2020 shutdown, closures affected at least:

• 124,000 public and private schools
• 55.1 million students

Education Week tracked the closures from their beginning in early March through the widespread shutdown of school buildings across the country.

Most children technically remained enrolled and were assigned remote lessons. That is not the same as receiving no education whatsoever.

But virtual enrollment did not recreate the classroom.

Millions of children lost daily interaction with teachers, classmates, counselors, therapists and special-education providers. Some returned within months. Others remained fully remote or on hybrid schedules through much of the 2020–2021 school year.

Historic academic declines

The Nation’s Report Card later found that average scores among nine-year-olds declined:

• Five points in reading
• Seven points in mathematics

The reading decline was the largest recorded since 1990. The mathematics result was the first decline recorded in that long-term assessment. No measured student group improved in either subject.

Among 13-year-olds, later assessments showed declines of four points in reading and nine points in mathematics compared with the previous test given during the 2019–2020 school year.

Those results cannot be attributed solely to Fauci or even solely to school closures. The pandemic involved illness, deaths, economic stress, disrupted routines and broad social instability.

But prolonged removal from normal classrooms was plainly part of the educational crisis.

Children’s mental health

The CDC reported that from mid-March through October 2020, the proportion of mental-health-related emergency-department visits increased by approximately:

• 24 percent among children ages 5 through 11
• 31 percent among adolescents ages 12 through 17

The total number of pediatric emergency-department visits initially declined, so these percentages refer to the share of visits involving mental health, not necessarily a 24 or 31 percent increase in the raw number of children seen.

School disruption cannot be blamed for every case. Children were also experiencing family illness, bereavement, unemployment, isolation and interruptions in medical and mental-health care.

Nevertheless, policymakers were warned that restrictions carried costs—and children paid some of those costs.

Businesses ordered closed

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately:

• 1.6 million business establishments
• representing 19 percent of establishments surveyed
• experienced a government-mandated closure during 2020.

Those establishments employed approximately 26 million workers.

“Establishment” means an operating location. A business with several locations may be counted more than once.

The 1.6 million figure also does not mean that every establishment closed permanently. It means they experienced a government-ordered closure at some point.

But the economic shock was unmistakable. Total nonfarm employment ended 2020 approximately 10 million jobs below its February peak. BLS attributed the historic losses to the pandemic, government restrictions and the public’s efforts to avoid infection.

Behind those statistics were restaurant owners, barbers, gym operators, independent retailers and family businesses that lacked government salaries, protected pensions or access to prestigious international prizes.

Was Fauci responsible for the shutdowns?

Fauci did not possess the legal authority to close every American business or school.

Governors, mayors, state health officials, local health departments and school boards issued the actual orders.

That distinction matters.

But it would be equally misleading to pretend that Fauci was merely a powerless observer.

He was America’s most influential infectious-disease adviser and a central public advocate for aggressive restrictions. In April 2020, he publicly argued that every state should adopt stay-at-home measures. Those orders typically closed or heavily restricted businesses classified as nonessential.

Fauci later supported broad masking and defended strong distancing measures. He also eventually argued for reopening schools in many circumstances and said that the country should seek to control transmission without repeatedly shutting everything down.

His position evolved as the pandemic and available evidence changed.

The fair conclusion is this:

Fauci did not sign every closure order, but his authority, public platform and recommendations helped legitimize the restrictions that state and local leaders imposed.

Whether that influence was used wisely—and whether policymakers adjusted quickly enough when evidence changed—is central to evaluating his legacy.

The six-foot rule that “sort of just appeared”

During congressional questioning in January 2024, Fauci was asked about the scientific basis for requiring six feet of physical separation.

He replied that the rule had “sort of just appeared” and characterized it as an empirical decision that was not based on a specific body of data he could identify.

That does not mean distance was meaningless.

Greater distance generally reduces exposure to exhaled particles. The risk is also affected by ventilation, filtration, duration, crowding, whether people are indoors and the amount of virus being emitted.

What lacked firm scientific support was the treatment of exactly six feet as a magical boundary between safety and danger.

The rigid rule influenced classroom capacity, restaurant seating, business operations and public behavior across the country.

Americans were entitled to know whether a rule with such sweeping consequences rested on strong evidence, a cautious approximation or institutional guesswork.

What the diaries reveal about the laboratory-origin question

The released records do not prove that Fauci knew with certainty that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a laboratory.

They do support a narrower and important conclusion:

Fauci knew very early that respected scientists considered a laboratory-associated origin a genuine scientific possibility.

Bat ancestry and a laboratory accident are not mutually exclusive. A bat-related coronavirus could conceivably reach humans through natural spillover, wildlife collection, laboratory research, accidental exposure or another route.

The central accountability question is therefore not whether Fauci privately wrote, “I know it came from a lab.” The available records do not establish such a definitive admission.

The question is whether the uncertainty discussed privately was communicated honestly to the public—or whether the laboratory possibility was publicly dismissed with greater confidence than the private evidence justified.

Any serious investigation must compare:

• Fauci’s dated diary entries
• His emails with virologists
• Scientific conference-call records
• Public interviews given on those same dates
• Sworn congressional testimony
• Government funding and grant-review records

The diaries are evidence. They are not, standing alone, the final verdict on COVID’s origin.

Celebrity, recognition and legacy

Fauci began the pandemic with extraordinary public support.

An April 2020 Quinnipiac poll found:

• 78 percent approved of his handling of the crisis
• Only 7 percent disapproved

He was trusted across much of the political spectrum.

By December 2021, Gallup found his approval had fallen to approximately 52 percent, with the country nearly evenly divided.

An August 2025 Annenberg survey found 57 percent expressed confidence in Fauci while 43 percent did not—still substantial support, but far removed from his near-universal early-pandemic standing.

The diary material reportedly contains extensive attention to interviews, television appearances, awards, celebrity encounters, public praise and Fauci’s rapidly expanding profile. That can reasonably create the impression of an official intensely conscious of his reputation and legacy.

Whether that reflects ordinary recordkeeping, understandable amazement at sudden fame, vanity or a deeper failure of priorities is ultimately a matter of interpretation.

My conclusion, after reviewing the emerging record, is that Fauci comes across as remarkably focused on personal recognition during a period in which ordinary Americans were making extraordinary sacrifices.

That is an opinion.

The emails, award payments and government assistance are the underlying facts on which that opinion rests.

What the evidence does—and does not—prove

The released records support reporting that:

• Fauci actively discussed and pursued certain awards.
• He offered to provide nomination material.
• Scientific colleagues formally nominated him.
• NIAID employees helped prepare or strengthen submissions.
• Federal staff assisted with ethics, payment and publicity matters.
• The Dan David Prize deposited $899,960 into Fauci’s bank account.
• Fauci personally received an additional $12,500 from the Elliot Richardson Prize.
• His identified cash-award proceeds therefore total at least $912,460.
• Fauci advocated major pandemic restrictions and held enormous influence over national policy.
• The exact six-foot threshold lacked a clearly identified scientific foundation.
• Fauci knew that a laboratory-associated origin was being seriously discussed by scientists early in the pandemic.

The documents do not presently prove that:

• Fauci was bribed.
• He traded federal grants for nominations.
• Every colleague who nominated him received favorable treatment.
• He illegally accepted the Dan David money.
• Fauci personally ordered every school or business closed.
• He knew conclusively that COVID escaped from a laboratory.
• His award pursuits caused any COVID deaths.
• Every policy he supported was ineffective.

Those distinctions do not weaken the investigation.

They strengthen it.

A case built on exaggerated allegations can be dismissed. A case built on authenticated records, exact wording and clearly drawn limits is far harder to escape.

The question America deserves answered

Anthony Fauci was already highly compensated, internationally respected and entrusted with enormous governmental power.

While Americans were burying loved ones, losing livelihoods and watching their children fall behind, Fauci and people working inside his federal office helped pursue and administer prestigious awards that provided him with more than $912,000 in personal cash proceeds.

Government ethics officials may have concluded that accepting the largest payment was permissible under existing regulations.

But legality is the floor—not the ceiling—for ethical public service.

Americans deserve to know:

• How many taxpayer-funded work hours were devoted to Fauci’s nominations?
• Did employees feel pressured to assist their boss?
• Were government accomplishments repackaged to obtain his private financial reward?
• Did nominators or their institutions depend on funding controlled by Fauci’s agency?
• Did ethics reviewers examine only the acceptance of the money—or also the process used to pursue it?
• Would an ordinary federal employee have received the same institutional assistance?
• Why was an official managing a national emergency so engaged with prizes, publicity and personal legacy?

And perhaps the simplest question of all:

While the country was being ordered to sacrifice, who was holding its most powerful public-health officials accountable?

Fauci’s defenders will say the awards recognized a lifetime of scientific service.

His critics will see a man consumed by status while the public suffered under policies he helped promote.

The records now belong to the American people.

They should read them—and decide for themselves.

A Personal Note From Steven Tauriello

Perhaps the most disturbing question of the entire COVID era is this:

How did one unelected government official accumulate so much influence over the daily lives of the American people?

Dr. Anthony Fauci did not personally sign every school-closure order, close every business or issue every vaccine mandate. Governors, presidents, military leaders, health departments, employers and school boards exercised their own authority.

But Fauci became the face and voice of the system that justified it all.

His recommendations carried enormous weight. His words influenced whether children entered classrooms, whether businesses opened their doors, whether Americans covered their faces, whether families gathered together and whether workers believed they would be allowed to keep their jobs without accepting a medical treatment.

We watched schools close.

We watched businesses collapse.

We watched children lose irreplaceable time in classrooms.

We watched Americans ordered to remain inside their homes, stand six feet apart and cover their faces.

We watched members of the military discharged after refusing COVID vaccinations.

We watched workers across the country face one of the most coercive ultimatums a government can impose:

Accept the shot—or risk losing the job that feeds your family.

No American should ever be placed in that position again.

The government should never be permitted to force a medical procedure upon a citizen through threats against that person’s employment, education, military career or ability to participate in ordinary society.

It should never again be able to close a person’s business, remove children from classrooms, confine healthy citizens to their homes or transform emergency guidance into open-ended control without overwhelming evidence, strict legal limits and meaningful public accountability.

The American people should never forget what happened in 2020.

This did not happen to some distant, anonymous population.

It happened to us.

It happened to me and to you.

It happened to our mothers and fathers, our sons and daughters, our husbands and wives, our brothers and sisters, our grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, neighbors and coworkers.

We were told where we could go, whom we could visit, whether we could work, whether our businesses were considered essential and what medical decisions we were expected to make.

Families were separated from loved ones in hospitals and nursing homes. People died without relatives beside them. Funerals were restricted. Churches were closed. Children were isolated. Parents were terrified of losing their incomes.

The American people were not merely inconvenienced.

We were subjected to an extraordinary expansion of government authority over the most personal areas of human life.

And there has been no true national reckoning.

There has been no comprehensive accounting of who made each decision, what evidence supported it, what evidence was ignored, which restrictions caused more harm than benefit and why officials who got major decisions wrong continued receiving promotions, awards, book deals, television appearances and public praise.

There are more Dr. Faucis in the federal government.

There will always be officials who believe their expertise gives them the right to make decisions for millions of citizens. There will always be institutions willing to expand their authority during an emergency. There will always be politicians who find it easier to defer to unelected experts than to accept responsibility themselves.

That is precisely why accountability matters.

Without a reckoning, it will happen again.

The next emergency may involve another virus, a cyberattack, terrorism, climate, financial instability or a threat we cannot yet imagine. The justification will change, but the temptation will remain the same:

Give the government extraordinary power now, and ask questions later.

Americans must reject that bargain.

Emergency authority must be limited, transparent, temporary and subject to legislative and judicial oversight. Scientific advice must remain advice—not unquestionable law. Public-health officials must disclose uncertainty rather than disguise assumptions as settled science. Policies must be continually reevaluated as evidence changes.

Most importantly, Americans must retain the right to make decisions about their own bodies, families, children, businesses and livelihoods.

COVID became a battle over ideas, rights and the proper limits of government power.

Some Americans complied because they were afraid.

Some complied because they trusted the government.

Some complied because they believed it was necessary to protect others.

Others resisted because they believed the government had crossed a constitutional and moral line.

They refused the vaccine.

They refused masks.

They reopened their businesses.

They demanded that their children return to school.

Whether a person agreed with each act of resistance or not, the right to question government authority is fundamental to the American system.

The answer to government overreach is not violence. It is determined, lawful resistance through elections, courts, investigations, legislation, journalism, public-record requests, congressional oversight and the refusal to surrender constitutional rights merely because officials declare an emergency.

COVID eventually faded, but we cannot honestly say the American people decisively won the argument over government power.

In many ways, the emergency simply ended before the country fully confronted what had been done.

That is not enough.

The framers of this country distrusted concentrated power because they understood human nature. They knew that authority granted during a crisis is rarely surrendered willingly. They designed a system in which government answers to the people—not one in which citizens must ask permission from government officials to work, worship, assemble, educate their children or make medical decisions.

The lesson of COVID must never be forgotten:

No person, agency or administration should ever again be allowed to accumulate that degree of unchecked influence over the American people.

There must be investigations.

There must be transparency.

There must be reforms.

There must be consequences where laws or ethical rules were violated.

And there must be safeguards strong enough to prevent the same abuses from being repeated under a different official, a different administration or a different emergency.

Americans should remember COVID—not to remain trapped in anger, but to ensure that fear is never again used to strip away rights without accountability.

We must make certain that the next generation does not face the same ultimatum:

Obey—or lose your job.

Comply—or lose your education.

Submit—or lose your place in society.

Not again.

Not in this country.