Donald Trump picked Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a Stanford doctor silenced for challenging Biden administration lockdown policies, to run the National Institutes of Health.
Trump says that Bhattacharya will work with Secretary of Health and Human Services nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr. while running the country's top public funder of medical research with a budget of some $47.3 billion.
The president-elect said in a statement: 'Together, Jay and RFK Jr. will restore the NIH to a Gold Standard of Medical Research as they examine the underlying causes of, and solutions to, America's biggest Health challenges, including our Crisis of Chronic Illness and Disease. Together, they will work hard to Make America Healthy Again!
Bhattacharya, a Stanford health policy professor and doctor, was an outspoken critic of the U.S. government's COVID-19 policies during the pandemic.
The Stanford-trained physician and economist met with Kennedy this week and impressed him with his ideas to overhaul NIH.
Bhattacharya has called for shifting the agency's focus toward funding more innovative research and reducing the influence of some of its longest-serving career officials, the report added.
