Where are they now? White House Covid Task Force members cashed in on pandemic panic

Almost 4 years later, things are going swimmingly for the virus panic corps.

The White House Coronavirus Task Force was spun up on January 29, 2020. Shortly thereafter, the federal government began to deploy countless billions of dollars to pharmaceutical companies with the ostensible hopes to mitigate a much-hyped incoming pandemic.

Now, almost four years later, our hindsight presents a much clearer picture to the fog of virus mania we experienced in realtime.

Instead of mobilizing an effective public-private response to the advertised problem, Operation Warp Speed and the Task Force served as a vehicle for further panic and the facilitating of taxpayer cash that ended up enriching the pharmaceutical industry. These taxpayer-funded, Covid-related slush funds ballooned to astronomical heights across two presidencies, delivering record profits to Pharma companies that took pains to bring themselves onsides with the people in charge in Washington, D.C.

Tragically, the government-backed mechanical (ventilators) and pharmaceutical (remdesivir, mRNA shots, etc) interventions didn’t work to remedy the respiratory illness problem. Instead, they added an additional layer of chaos on top of the virus mania that had captured the world.

Operation Warp Speed and the resulting Task Force operation was, by all objective accounts, a catastrophic blunder, but that didn’t stop many of its members from parlaying their roles on the high visibility government detail into successful post service gigs.

So we thought now would be a good time to take a look at some of the healthcare/pharma-related government officials responsible for some of those fateful decisions, and where they are today.

Mike Pence:

He was primarily responsible for staffing the Trump Administration’s Covid response team. Pence launched his presidential bid in June, but gave up by October. He is perhaps the only Task Force member who did not benefit from the operation, as his political career is effectively over.

Anthony Fauci:

The most notorious member of the Task Force, Fauci’s wealth increased multiple times over while serving as the Pharma kingmaker over at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). He recently took a no-show professorship at Georgetown University and is said to be working on a book.

Deborah Birx:

The second most infamous member of the Task Force, Birx, a protege of the Bill Gates network, has also cashed in on her time in the spotlight. She has since joined multiple pharmaceutical boards and wrote a book attempting to generate even more virus hysteria.

Moncef Slaoui

Technically not a member of the Task Force but the leader of Operation Warp Speed. Slaoui succeeded in delivering preferential treatment to Moderna, where he had a board seat and $10 million in stock options. Moderna stock would jump 20x from January of 2020 to late 2021. Slaoui left Operation Warp Speed in January 2021 to join a GSK-owned pharmaceutical company. He was later fired due to a sexual harassment claim.

Alex Azar

A former president at Eli Lily, he briefly chaired the White House Task Force. As the head of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Azar facilitated billions of dollars in funding to vaccine companies. Like his colleagues, Azar has since joined several pharmaceutical and healthcare boards.

Jerome Adams

After leaving the White House, the former Surgeon General became Purdue University’s “Executive Director of Health Equity Initiatives,” sporting a salary of half a million dollars a year for the gig. He also joined the boards of half a dozen healthcare and pharmaceutical companies. The hyper woke activist just penned a book casting himself as a “front line hero” in the fight against Covid-19.

Brett Giroir

The Trump Administration’s assistant secretary for health (succeeded by the transgender identifying admiral “Rachel” Levine) spun right through the revolving door with his colleagues. He now serves as CEO and a member of the board of a respiratory virus treatment company. He also wrote a book on “fighting Covid from the front lines to the White House.”

Stephen Hahn

Hahn served as the FDA commissioner and a member of the Task Force. Only six months after authorizing the Moderna mRNA shot, he went on to serve as the chief medical officer of Flagship Pioneering, the venture capital firm behind Moderna. He has since joined multiple ventures seeking to get products approved for FDA clearance.

Robert Redfield

The former CDC director who once declared masks as superior to vaccines has joined quite a few boards related to Pharma and healthcare.

Seema Verma

As CMS Director, this Task Force member issued the infamous memo leaning on healthcare systems to suspend non elective procedures. After her tenure in the Trump Administration, Verma joined the boards of several healthcare firms and became a Senior Vice President at Oracle Corporation.