fauci nih
Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, in Washington DC on September 23, 2020.
Alex Edelman / AFP via Getty Images
  • Dr. Anthony Fauci said his daughter’s boyfriend’s brother died from COVID-19 at age 32. 
  • “So there you have a 32-year-old young man, otherwise healthy actually, quite athletic and strong, who died,” he told CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta during a talk for the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. 
  • The man developed an unusual heart complication related to the virus that led to his death, Fauci said. 
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Dr. Anthony Fauci’s youngest daughter, Alison, is grieving the loss of her boyfriend’s brother, a 32-year-old who died from COVID-19.

“My youngest daughter’s boyfriend’s brother is a 32-year-old young man, athletic, healthy, who got COVID-19, and had one of the unusual complications of cardiomyopathy with an arrhythmia and died,” the nation’s top infectious disease expert told Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN’S chief medical correspondent, during an interview Wednesday hosted by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. 

The death is a tragic example of how the virus can affect anyone, no matter their age or health status. “So there you have a 32-year-old young man, otherwise healthy actually, quite athletic and strong, who died,” Fauci said. 

Outside of clear causes like serious underlying conditions, Fauci said he still doesn’t know why some people like Alison’s boyfriend’s brother get seriously ill or die, while most others experience no or mild symptoms.  

“The mystery that haunts me [is] the idea that you have a virus that in most people is almost harmless, … then in those who get symptoms, most people don’t get severe symptoms, and then in another subgroup, inexplicably, makes them so sick that you get 280,000 deaths in the United States,” he said.

"There has to be motivation enough for at least most of the people to adhere to the public health issues and public health recommendations that we make," he added. 

This is a developing story. More to follow.

Read the original article on Business Insider