Concerning Dr. Faucci and early HIV treatment.
Thought I'd share an interesting story I heard lately. A recent visit to the dentist I have been going to for nearly 20 years now, an absolute professional a brilliant man and conservative is the source of the story. Knowing that we share similar values, he likes to chat it up about about politics and things when I come in. In the most recent visit A conversation about the vaccine and Dr Faucci came up. He said he had his own run in with Dr Faucci early on in his career. Monroe county (Rochester NY) has always had a large gay community, decades ago referred to as the San Francisco of the east coast. When HIV/AIDS was in its infantcy and before there was any real treatment it was brought to my dentists attention that the HIV infected community in the Monroe County area could not get attention from any dentists, they were all afraid of contracting the virus. My dentist did his research and realized he could work on these people without risk of contracting the virus. He put the word out and the patients started flooding in. For some procedures he would prescribe a certain antibiotic and after some time it was realized that the antibiotic was having a positive effect on the HIV virus. Dr. William Valenti was the head of the Monroe county health department at the time and was also a friend of the dentist. They got together and concluded that they needed to start writing prescriptions for this antibiotic to all people in the community with the HIV virus. Not too long after they both received calls from Anthony Faucci informing them that they were to stop prescribing the antibiotic or he would come for their licenses. They responded by saying if he came for their licenses they would sound the alarm in the gay community and ultimately Faucci left them alone.
I know how important sauce is around here and I am sorry i don't have receipts for you. Understand that this was in a time when people were still using rotary phones. No internet at that time.. It was just a story told to me from the dentist and I left his name out on purpose. I do have an article on the head of the Monroe county health director about his work in pioneering treatment for HIV.
https://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/news/local/2013/10/28/dr-william-valenti-honored-for-his-career-in-helping-people-with-hiv-/3286907/