“Rachel, it’s never really a good time to leave, but you have to leave sometime. I have been wanting to pursue another chapter in my career, as you mentioned a bit ago, because I’ve been wanting to do things outside of the government,” Fauci said. “Particularly, to do things, be they lecture or write or get involved in situations where I can serve as hope and inspiration to encourage young people to go into public service, particularly in the arena of science, medicine and public health.”

Fauci admitted that he had planned on retiring sooner, but accepted President Biden’s request that he join the administration, incorrectly believing that the COVID outbreak would be over by now.

“I was thinking of doing that right after the Trump administration ended, but when President Biden was elected he very quickly asked me, and I accepted with a great deal of honor, to do that, to be his chief medical adviser,” Fauci said, “I thought that was going to last one year, because like so many other people, I thought that the COVID outbreak would be over at the end of the first year of the Biden administration. But obviously it’s not.”

But Fauci finds solace in retiring at a moment when COVID is declining across the country.

“Since things look like they’re starting to stabilize a bit, and I believe in the next few months we will do better than we’re doing now, I felt, again, I might as well do it now,” Fauci said, “because I want to make sure that when I do leave, I still have the energy and the passion, and the health, to do the kind of things that I want to do.”