Who is Jay Bhattacharya? 5 things to know about Donald Trump's Kolkata-origin choice for head of NIH

Jay Bhattacharya has been appointed as the head of National Institutes of Health (NIH), known to be the health research powerhouse in the US. Photo Courtesy: Official account of Jay Bhattacharya

US President-elect Donald Trump on November 26 announced that he was thrilled to nominate Kolkata-born Indian-American scientist Jay Bhattacharya as the head of National Institutes of Health. It is the country's leading health research institution. The NIH, an agglomeration of 27 separate research organisations dealing with different diseases and health issues, has an annual budget of $48 billion

An elated Bhattacharya said on X (formerly known as Twitter), "We will reform American scientific institutions so that they are worthy of trust again and will deploy the fruits of excellent science to make America healthy again!"

Bhattacharya is yet another Indian-origin expert in the US government, apart from Kamala Harris, who was in the race for the position for the US president, before she lost.

As the buzz around him grows, here are five things you need to know about him:

Origins
Jayanta Bhattacharya, popularly known as Jay Bhattacharya was born in Kolkata in India in 1968. While now being an American citizen, he is also known to be a practicing Christian.

Education and expertise
Bhattacharya is a multi-disciplinary academic who graduated from Stanford University in 1990. He also holds professorships in medicine, economics, and health professorship, holding a medical degree and a PhD in economics.

Rise to prominence
Bhattacharya raised questions about Covid policies. He shot to national prominence during the Covid pandemic by questioning the prevalent orthodoxy of the government health establishment of imposing extended broad lockdowns to fight the disease and went head-to-head with Anthony Fauci, who was acclaimed as the architect of the official policy. Trump also said he is a co-author of The Great Barrington declaration, an alternative to lockdowns, proposed in October 2020.

Succession
Bhattacharya will succeed Monica Bertagnolli, who is an American surgical oncologist and the 17th director of the National Institutes of Health.

Future work
Trump said that Bhattacharya would work with Health Secretary nominee Robert F Kennedy, Jr, to restore NIH "to a gold standard of medical research as they examine the underlying causes of, solutions to, America's biggest health challenges, including a crisis of chronic illness and disease". While Kennedy opposes vaccinations, Bhattacharya does not. Kennedy advocates unorthodox treatments and theories, which have come under criticism, but his and Trump's focus on chronic diseases has been praised by some critics.