On Call: A Doctor's Journey in Public Service

by Anthony Fauci

It was shortly after this that a dear and wise friend, Dr. James F. Dickson III, stopped by my office one afternoon and gave me sage advice that I have never forgotten. Jim was a thoracic surgeon who, after graduating from Harvard Medical School, trained in general and thoracic surgery at Boston City Hospital. In 1950, he was drafted into the U.S. Army and was deployed to South Korea as chief of surgery at the 8055th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) during the Korean War. He was the real-life prototype for Trapper John from the hit television show M*A*S*H. Years later, he worked in the Nixon and Reagan administrations, where I first met him. We had a common academic heritage; he studied Latin and Greek under the Jesuits at Boston Latin School twenty years before I did the same at Regis High School. We became fast friends, and Jim assumed the role as my elder statesman adviser after I became director of NIAID. I mentioned to him one day that I was on my way to the White House at the vice president’s request. “Tony,” he said, “it’s a good rule when you are walking into the West Wing of the White House to advise the president, vice president, or the White House staff to remind yourself that this might be the last time you will walk through that door. If you base your advice on the truth and on scientific evidence and do not sugarcoat anything, it is likely that sooner or later you will be telling the president or the vice president something they really don’t want to hear...