Atul Gawande is Biden's pick to lead Bureau for Global Health

Dr. Atul Gawande

Photo: Lisa Lake/Getty Images

President Joe Biden will nominate Dr. Atul Gawande as assistant administrator of the Bureau for Global Health, United States Agency for International Development, the White House announced this week.

Gawande said in a tweet, "I'm honored to be nominated to lead global health development at @USAID, including for COVID. With more COVID deaths worldwide in the first half of 2021 than in all of 2020, I'm grateful for the chance to help end this crisis and to re-strengthen public health systems worldwide."

The objective of the United States Agency for International Development is to improve global health, including child, maternal and reproductive health, and to reduce abortion and disease, especially HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis, according to the World Health Organization. The Global Health Bureau supports field health programs and innovation with a portfolio of nearly $4.15 billion.

WHY THIS MATTERS

Gawande, a Brigham and Women's Hospital surgeon, founder of Ariadne Labs and Lifebox, best-selling author and a staff writer for The New Yorker, has recently been most prominently known as the former CEO of Haven, a healthcare venture formed in 2018 by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase, to take cost out of the health system through technical innovation.

Haven disbanded after three years, after piloting health insurance programs for company employees. The founders said each company would leverage insights learned from Haven to address the specific needs of its own employee populations. 

During the coronavirus pandemic, Gawande cofounded CIC Health, which operates COVID-19 testing and vaccination nationally, and served as a member of the Biden transition COVID-19 Advisory Board. He previously served as a senior advisor in the Department of Health and Human Services in the Clinton Administration.

THE LARGER TREND

Gawande was among 11 individuals announced as Biden Administration nominees on Tuesday.

Another healthcare-related nomination is Dr. Rahul Gupta, for director of National Drug Control Policy.

Gupta, a practicing primary care physician, is the chief medical and health officer and senior vice president for March of Dimes. He currently also serves as clinical professor in the department of medicine at Georgetown University School of Medicine, adjunct professor in the department of health policy, management and leadership in the School of Public Health at West Virginia University, and visiting faculty member at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Gupta previously served under two governors as the health commissioner of West Virginia and as the state's chief health officer, leading efforts in the opioid crisis response and the development of the state's Zika action plan and its preparedness efforts during the Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak.

Twitter: @SusanJMorse
Email the writer: susan.morse@himssmedia.com