Who Answers for the Children of COVID?

Anthony Fauci’s diary has been released, and it confirmed what we already knew about him: that he’s a raging narcissist, a liar, and unwilling to take responsibility for his actions. The diary confirmed that he knew exactly what he was doing, repeatedly misled the public, and has zero remorse for the worldwide harm caused by COVID-era policies.

On Wednesday, July 29th, Republican senators questioned the lying weasel about his time as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fauci didn’t answer one question. Instead, he repeated over 100 times, “Under the advice of my attorneys, I will invoke my right under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution to refrain from answering your questions.”

More than six years after the world shut down, a moment like this should’ve felt cathartic. However, all it did was drudge up the insurmountable anger, loss, and grief that many of us have tried to put behind us. This sociopath was pardoned and continues to face no real consequences, so yes, people are still mad.

Dr. Fauci is certainly the highest-profile villain of COVID, but he isn’t the only villain. Perhaps it’s easier to be angrier at him than at the people whose betrayal was the most personal: our friends, neighbors, coworkers, and even family members who would have gladly turned us into the gulag for refusing to comply with lockdowns, masks, and vaccine mandates. It isn’t healthy to hold onto anger and resentment forever, but it also isn’t healthy to be abused for years and then pretend that nothing happened, allowing the abuse to be repeated in the future.

The most disturbing and eye-opening aspect of the COVID era was how children were treated as sacrificial lambs. Viewing COVID as an existential threat, otherwise normal adults forgot basic principles of childhood development. Children were locked in their homes, forced onto screens, masked, deprived of important life events, pitted against one another, told they were going to kill Grandma, and taught to fear the air they breathed. Then they were given experimental shots, all for a virus that posed virtually zero threat to them.

The total damage COVID policies did to children is impossible to measure. According to an Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health meta analysis from 2021, “A high prevalence of COVID-19-related fear was noted among children and adolescents, as well as more depressive and anxious symptoms compared with prepandemic estimates. Older adolescents, girls, and children and adolescents living with neurodiversities and/or chronic physical conditions were more likely to experience negative mental health outcomes. Many studies reported mental health deterioration among children and adolescents due to COVID-19 pandemic control measures.”

In the name of COVID “safety,” children’s physical health was also compromised. Ironically, COVID had minimal health effects on children, but keeping them isolated at home, out of the sunlight, away from sports, with limited access to healthcare services had a significant negative impact on their health. In May of 2021, the NIH concluded, “Harms of school closure on child and adolescent health seem to exceed some indicators of positive health care system effects.” This study emphasized the damage from decreased access to school-based services, especially for lower income families and children with disabilities.

Many people hope that one day, Anthony Fauci will answer for his role in the tyrannical government overreach of COVID. But what about everyone else? What responsibility belongs to government officials, school administrators, healthcare leaders, employers, journalists, and ordinary citizens who enforced or cheered on these policies? At what point does “following orders” stop being an excuse? Those are uncomfortable questions, but they are necessary to ask.

If you still feel angry, you’re not alone. Don’t let anyone convince you that remembering what happened is the same as refusing to heal. Sometimes it’s a sign that something profoundly wrong happened and was never acknowledged, let alone corrected. Forgiveness and healing do not require pretending that the abuse never occurred.

The goal is not to remain consumed by resentment. It’s to learn from the past, demand accountability where it’s warranted, and make sure that children are never forced to bear this kind of burden again.