Dr Fauci has been the target of a video released on Monday evening by Project Veritas claiming that he was involved in research projects related to coronaviruses by the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The far right activist campaign group alleged that Dr Fauci, as the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, allowed for gain of function research to go ahead in Wuhan despite the Department of Defense saying the risk was too high.

On Tuesday, the NIAID director told a senate committee on that “What came out last night in Project Veritas was a grant that was submitted to the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and was “distorted” so that it appeared to blame Dr Fauci for the research.

“We have never seen that grant and we have never funded that grant. So once again, you are completely and unequivocally incorrect when you join the DARPA proposal, was a grant that we never saw and did not fund. So you are incorrect,” said Dr Fauci in font of senator Roger Marshall.

Dr Fauci has repeatedly been forced to defend himself and the NIAID’s work from Republican attacks, including that of senator Rand Paul who called for the US chief medical adviser “to prison for five years for lying to Congress” in December, as Graig Graziosi reported:

While UK health experts say Omicron has peaked in the country, those in the US have suggested that the highly contagious variant of Covid-19 will also soon peak.

The US on Monday reported 1.35 million new coronavirus infections, which a Reuters tally found was the highest daily total of any country in the world so far.

The seven-day average for new cases has meanwhile tripled in two weeks to over 700,000 new infections daily, and a record number of people are currently hospitalised with the virus in the US.

Deaths are around 1,700 a day, and at levels seen earlier this winter, Reuters found.

On Tuesday, the US chief medical adviser suggested that Omicron would “ultimately find just about everybody”, at which point the wave will begin to die out. He added that the US was on the “threshold” of the virus becoming endemic.

Senator Rand Paul has been blasted as “unbalanced” and “delusional” after he doubled down with new attack on Dr Anthony Fauci following a senate committee hearing.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director said during a senate committee hearing on Tuesday that there was an “urgent need” for a so-called super vaccine because of “the inevitable continual emergence of new variants”.

He added that NIAID was making significant progress on the issue, which would allow the US and countries globally to deliver “a pan-coronavirus vaccine, namely one that would be effective against all SARS-COVID-2 variants, and ultimately against all coronaviruses, becomes even more apparent”.

As John Bowden and Meghan Sheets write, his comments come amid concerns about the Omicron variant’s effectiveness at evading some of the protection provided by the vaccine, although a majority of those currently hospitalised in the US are the unvaccinated, the CDD has said.

The CEO of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, has said that a vaccine for the highly transmissible Omicron variant of Covid-19 will be ready in March and that the pharmaceutical company has begun manufacturing the doses.

“The hope is that we will achieve something that will have way, way better protection particularly against infections, because the protection against the hospitalizations and the severe disease – it is reasonable right now, with the current vaccines as long as you are having let’s say the third dose,” Dr Bourla said.

As Gustaf Kilander writes, Dr Fauci said in December that a variant specific booster would not be unnecessary because the current booster shots provide enough protection.

Although during a senate committee hearing on Tuesday Dr Fauci said he believed Omicron meant there was an “urgent need” for a so-called super vaccine that would be more effective at preventing new variants of Covid-19 and other coronaviruses.

Republican senator Rand Paul continued attacking Dr Fauci on Tuesday night and again made false allegations about the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director.

“We want people to go to RandPaul.com if they want to get rid of Tony Fauci,” said Mr Paul in an appearance on Fox News.

“It is a political thing. He is a political creature. We think he should be put up on charges but he’s not going to until there’s an intervening election. So elections do make a difference.”

The Republican’s counter-attack came after Dr Fauci on Tuesday accused him of “distorting” facts about Covid-19 and the NIAID’s work with the Wuhan institute of virology, who many Republicans have argued was to blame for the virus following gain of function research.

Dr Fauci has described such allegations as “nonsense” and of an “anti-scientific flavour”, with the US having had no known role in the enhancement of coronaviruses in Wuhan’s lab.

Dr Paul continued on Tuesday night by calling Dr Fauci “a menace” and said”: “I think he has lied to the American public. I think that he funded the lab in Wuhan that in all likelihood this virus came from. I think he as ignored natural immunity. I think he has told people to wear a cloth mask when they don’t work”.

Those claims were based on no scientific understanding.

The Democrat senator shared a graphic headed “Not all masks are created equal” on Monday, which showed the different levels of protection offered by masks against Covid-19.

Mr Sanders, who has recently become a vocal supporter of issuing KN95 masks for all Americans, tweeted out the graphic amid reports that the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) may soon recommend the higher standard of face mask – rather than a fabric covering.

As Andrew Naughtie writes, KN95 masks were prioritised for healthcare workers at the beginning of the pandemic, and have a different design to standard face masks – so which is best?

Democrat congresswoman Ilhan Omar was among many to champion Dr Fauci on Tuesday for confronting senator Rand Paul for “distorting” information and facts about the US chief medical adviser, and of “making a catastrophic epidemic for your political gain”.

Ms Omar compared the encounter to when Democrat colleague Katie Porter used a marker pen and whiteboard to attack USPS post master Louis DeJoy, who was appointed by Donald Trump last year, for delivery failures.

Dr Fauci came to blows with senator Rand Paul during a committee hearing on Tuesday, and accused the lawmaker of “distorting everything about me”.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases told the senator that he was distorting the content of an email about scientific criticism, and kept on “coming back to personal attacks on me that have absolutely no relevance.”

The confrontation came to a head when Dr Fauci accused Mr Paul of attempting to build his personal brand amongst Republicans by fundraising with a “fire Dr Fauci” graphic on his website – with a print out from the senator’s website.

As Meghan Sheets and John Bowden write, the confrontation afterwards went viral on Twitter and follows a long-running feud between Republicans and Dr Fauci:

Dr Anthony Fauci said on Tuesday that US was approaching the “threshold” of living with Covid-19, and that almost everyone will be exposed to the highly-contagious Omicron variant eventually.

“Omicron, with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility, will ultimately find just about everybody,” he said in front of the the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

He said of an endemic: “When we get there, there’s that transition, and we may be on the threshold of that right now”.

His comments came as Omicron spreads through the US, which on Monday reported more than a million cases in 24 hours, and what is the highest known total for cases of an country so far.

Deaths from the virus have meanwhile been averaging at about 1,700 a day, and numbers of those vaccinated against Covid in the US remain below that of comparable countries, as Alisha Rahaman Sarkar writes: