Dr. Fauci: Quarantine Dating App Hookups Are (Kind of) Okay

I interrupt your regularly scheduled quarantine internet scrolling to bring you a critical update on the state of the COVID-19 pandemic in America: Dr. Fauci says it’s okay to hook up with a random from a dating app.

This is major news for the many sex-starved singles who have been taking out their sexual frustration on the internet in the form of flagrant displays of horniness on main in recent weeks. However, before we all race out to have sex with our next right-swipe, it’s worth noting that Fauci’s very cautious endorsement comes with some significant qualifications.

For one thing, it’s safe to say Dr. Fauci did not go to medical school just to police everyone’s horniness. So when the good doctor gave an interview on Snapchat’s “Good Luck America,” he probably wasn’t expecting to be asked, “If you’re swiping on a dating app like Tinder, or Bumble or Grindr, and you match with someone that you think is hot, and you’re just kind of like, ‘Maybe it’s fine if this one stranger comes over.’ What do you say to that person?”

But Fauci, who himself became a target of America’s unbridled quarantine-era horniness after a fan launched a Change.org campaign nominating him People’s Sexiest Man Alive last month, deigned to entertain the question, responding, “You know, that’s tough.”

So how did we all get from “That’s tough” to “Go forth and bang a rando”? According to Fauci, hookups fall under the category of “relative risk,” but if you’re willing to take that risk, well, that’s your business.

“If you’re willing to take a risk — and you know, everybody has their own tolerance for risks — you could figure out if you want to meet somebody,” said Fauci, adding, “If you want to go a little bit more intimate, well, then that’s your choice regarding a risk.”

So while Fauci didn’t exactly give a quarantine-era fuckfest the green light, the quarantined and horny remain free to hook up at their own risk.

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