Fauci under fire for releasing book on 'truth,' handling health crises: 'Most unsurprising thing ever'

Dr. Anthony Fauci is releasing a book about "truth" and "service" this year, drawing fierce criticism from detractors who have maligned his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Titled "Expect the Unexpected: Ten Lessons on Truth, Service, and the Way Forward Hardcover," the book will be released in November and is just 80 pages long. It is unclear if Fauci, who is the highest-paid U.S. federal employee, will keep or donate any of the proceeds from the book.

"With more than three decades spent combating some of the most dangerous diseases to strike humankind— AIDS, Ebola, COVID-19—Dr. Fauci has worked in daunting professional conditions and shouldered great responsibility. The earnest reflections in these pages offer a universal message on how to lead in times of crisis and find resilience in the face of disappointments and obstacles," the Barnes & Noble summary of the book reads. 

"Sure to strike a chord with readers, the inspiring words of wisdom in this book are centered around life lessons compiled from hours of interviews, offering a concrete path to a bright and hopeful future."

The longtime public health official has become internationally famous for leading the U.S. coronavirus response, but he has come under fire for his mixed messaging on everything from masks to vaccine efficacy to school opening measures, as well as caginess on what, if any role, American dollars could have played in Wuhan coronavirus research. 

The Wuhan Institute of Virology has become the subject of intense scrutiny for being the potential source of the pandemic, due in part to its "gain of function" research that involves modifying a virus to make it more infectious among humans. 

Fauci, who advises President Biden in addition to heading the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has defended the "modest" collaboration with Wuhan scientists studying bat coronaviruses while asserting the agency did not allocate the money to do "gain of function" research.

His conservative critics were unimpressed with the book deal, lashing out on Twitter at the face of the public health response to the pandemic.

"I really need the people in charge of handling this pandemic to stop writing books about how they're handling this pandemic while they're still doing it," Tablet's Noam Blum wrote.