Who is Jay Bhattacharya? Indian-origin doctor picked to lead health agency was against Covid lockdown- The Week

Donald Trump, the US president-elect, has nominated Indian-origin public health expert and economist, as the next director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

NIH, the country’s top public funder for health research, oversees a budget of $47.3 billion. The Stanford University professor of health policy is Trump’s first Indian American pick for a top administrative post.

Who is Jay Bhattacharya?

Born in 1968, Jay Bhattacharya hails from Kolkata and completed his medical studies at Stanford University in 1997. He got a PhD in economics from Stanford in 2000.

Bhattacharya, a physician, head Standford’s Center for Demography and Economics of Health and Aging. He is also a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

His latest research is on Covid-19 epidemiology and has published 135 articles in peer-reviewed journals in medical, economic and public health fields.

Responding to Trump’s appointment, Robert F Kennedy Jr said, “I’m so grateful to President Trump for this spectacular appointment.” He added that Bhattacharya is the ideal pick to restore NIH as the international template for “gold-standard science and evidence-based medicine.”

Bhattacharya said he is honoured and humbled by Trump’s nomination, adding that they will reform American scientific institutions so that “they are worthy of trust again”. “(We) …will deploy the fruits of excellent science to make America healthy again!” he added.