37
for a scientist. His parents were theater people who
lived in a farmhouse in Virginia’s Shenandoah Val-
ley. His father, a drama professor, and his mother, a
playwright, would put on performances in a grove of
oak trees behind the house every summer, in which
young Francis performed. Collins was homeschooled
by his mother until sixth grade, and what she lacked
in training she made up for in enthusiasm. “I learned
to love the experience of learning new things,” says
Collins. “That has served me very well as NIH direc-
tor, and particularly well this year,” when he might
have two days to make a decision about an area of
science “that was not exactly my sweet spot.” Collins
had to dive into studies on subjects like immunology
that before the pandemic he confesses he regarded
as a “little bit woolly.”
The theater training has helped him in other ways
too. Collins can read a room and adjust his level of dis-
course according to his audience. For academics, he
uses more pure science. For politicians, it’s all about
clearly articulated deliverables. “Everyone on our
health committee—and they’re 23 diff erent mem-
bers from Elizabeth Warren to Rand Paul—trusted
him,” says former Republican Senator Lamar Alexan-
der. “He has a very plainspoken way of talking about
the medical miracles that could happen over the next
eight to 10 years if we properly funded the work.”
There’s a folksiness to Collins, who has an old-
fashioned and formal way of speaking, in perfectly
grammatically correct sentences punctuated by an
occasional “oh boy” or “by golly.” He looks like the
kind of distinguished elderly gentleman that The
Simpsons’ next- diddly-door neighbor Ned Flanders
would grow into if cartoon characters aged. This ge-
niality, however, does not mask his drive. Even dur-
ing the pandemic, he still has a research lab with
postdocs, and in November the FDA approved a drug
for a premature- aging condition known as progeria
that was built on his research. He also plays guitar
well enough to have at least once sat in at Nashville’s
Bluebird Cafe, the jumping-off venue for such nota-
bles as Garth Brooks and Taylor Swift.
Despite the guitar chops, and his fondness for mo-
torcycles, nobody is going to accuse Francis (never
Frank) Collins of being anything but the squarest of
the quadrilaterals. The hobbies are a way of disarm-
ing people. He often composes ditties to play at the
farewell parties of staff members. At a meeting of
the NIH advisory committee in 2020 (held online),
he played guitar while the Gates Foundation’s Chris
Karp played piano and sang a song about the virus
to the tune of the Beatles’ “In My Life”: “With this
virus all around us/ Through the whole world, our
lives have changed.. .”
Collins studied chemistry at University of Vir-
ginia and did a Ph.D. at Yale before switching lanes
to medicine and landing in the then nascent fi eld of
genetic decoding in the early ’80s. He developed an
innovative method of gene fi nding, which led to the
identifi cation of the genetic sequences responsible
for cystic fi brosis, Huntington’s disease and neuro-
fi bromatosis, among others. In 1993, he was asked to
lead the government group that contributed to the
Human Genome Project, creating a map of the 3 bil-
lion DNA base pairs that make humans human.
After he was made NIH director in 2009, he set
about making the agency more focused on transla-
tional science— fi nding ways to convert scientifi c dis-
coveries into medical advances. When Collins sub-
mitted his resignation letter to President Trump, as
the NIH director generally does for each Adminis-
tration, he got a one-line email stating that it was re-
jected. “He is my nominee for Most Unsung Valuable
Player in health care during the last dozen years,”
says Alexander, who advocated for the Trump Ad-
ministration to make him one of the few Obama-era
appointees who kept his job.
IT MAY HAVE BEEN HYDROXYCHLOROQUINE that set
Collins on the path he’s taken during the pandemic.
Trump was touting its effi cacy in March, based on a
From left: Collins illustrating the
challenge of gene hunting in 1989;
with family in 1951 and 2003; with
his second wife Diane Baker in 2004
FAMILY PHOTOS: COLLINS FAMILY COLLECTION (2); HAYSTACK: TOM TREUTER; MOTORCYCLE: ERIC GREEN
