March 5 (UPI) — A relatively sedate Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing for National Institutes of Health Director-nominee Dr. Jay Bhattacharya revealed his five goals to improve people’s health.
Bhattacharya is a Stanford University professor and health researcher, and he has engaged in NIH-funded research for several decades, committee chairman Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., said about Bhattacharya while opening the confirmation hearing Wednesday morning at the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
Committee ranking member Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said the “health care system in our country is broken and is failing” despite spending almost twice as much per capita as any other industrialized nation and as more than 85 million Americans do not have health insurance.
Sanders said that, no matter who President Donald Trump nominates as a secretary of any federal agency, Department of Government Efficiency Director Elon Musk is in charge and already has assisted in terminating 1,200 workers at the NIH, and he froze grant funding.
He called Musk the “real leader” of the NIH and all other federal agencies and urged the committee invite Musk to explain such actions.
Sen. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., introduced Bhattacharya and said he contacted him and others during the COVID-19 pandemic while he was governor of Nebraska.
Ricketts said Bhattacharya “showed great intellectual honesty and courage” by providing alternative recommendations for handling the pandemic that differed from those recommended by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci and others.
He said Bhattacharya cautioned against lockdowns and their potential effect on people’s health, which led to Nebraska opening schools sooner than most other states.
“We were ranked as the No. 1 pandemic response state” by Politico, Ricketts said.
He lauded Bhattacharya’s experience as a health science researcher and said Bhattacharya understands the scientific method and “what science is about,” including “challenging ideas.”
After being introduced, Bhattacharya said he wants to help the NIH become a trusted source of health information and health research among the American public at a time when nearly three-fourths of the nation lacks confidence in the NIH and other health scientists to work in the public’s best interests.
Five goals for the NIH
Bhattacharya called the NIH the “crown jewel of American biomedical sciences” and said he has the “utmost respect” for its scientists and mission and said he has five goals for the NIH.
One is to focus NIH research that solves the nation’s chronic disease crisis, which he called “severe” and has hundreds of millions suffering from obesity, heart disease, cancer and more, which has caused the nation’s life expectancy to decline during the COVID-19 pandemic and has not reached pre-pandemic levels.
A second goal is to ensure NIH scientific research is replicable, reproducible, and generalizable, and cited a recent NIH-supported “research integrity scandal” involving research on Alzheimer’s disease that Bhattacharya said cast doubt on all related science supported by the NIH.
A third goal is to establish a culture of respect for free speech in science and dissent, which he said is the essence of quality research. Instead, recent NIH officials have overseen a “culture of cover-up, obfuscation and a lack of tolerance for ideas that differ from theirs.”
“Dissent is the very essence of science,” Bhattacharya said, adding that he would foster a culture in which NIH leadership will encourage different perspectives.
He said a fourth goal is to ensure the NIH invest in cutting-edge research in all fields, while a fight goal is to regulate risky research that has the potential to cause a pandemic.
The NIH must ensure that it never supports work that might cause harm,” Bhattacharya said.
National health concerns
Cassidy cited a rise in autism in the United States and asked Bhattacharya if there is any connection between the measles vaccine and autism.
Bhattacharya said there is no known cause for the nation’s rise in autism and doubts there is a link between the measles vaccine and a rise in autism, but he wants to investigate what might be causing higher rates of autism.
Sanders asked Bhattacharya if a company should be able to charge any price it wants on drugs that were developed with the help of NIH funding.
Bhattacharya said Congress is the body that should address such issues, to which Sanders said the president could issue an executive order.
Sanders also asked what Bhattacharya might do about wealthy people living on average seven years longer than working people and what Bhattacharya might do about chronic disease.
Bhattacharya suggested he would address the causes, including the rise in obesity, diabetes, and other factors that lower many people’s life expectancy.
Junk food advertising, food stamps
Sanders then asked about corporations that spend billions of dollars on advertising for unhealthy foods, to which Bhattacharya said he would support a “movement” to stop advertisers from advertising healthy foods.
Sanders suggested Bhattacharya could “lead that movement” and asked if he would support Sanders and others in opposing advertising for unhealthy foods, which Bhattacharya said he would do.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., suggested Bhattacharya could do more to improve the nation’s health by doing one thing — removing sugary drinks, junk food, potato chips and other unhealthy foods from food stamps eligibility.
Paul also cited vaccine hesitancy as a problem with national health and said the NIH should do more to invest in “good science” that makes it easier for people to confidently get vaccinated against various diseases.
Paul said he hopes Bhattacharya would focus NIH grant efforts to support research that addresses major diseases instead of focusing on research with relatively little impact on people’s health.
Bhattacharya said the NIH’s mission is to focus on research that makes American’s healthier and would ensure it abides by that mission.
The confirmation hearing lasted for two hours after starting at 10 a.m. EST and concluded with a mostly empty chamber after several senators left due to other obligations.
The NIH oversees more than $47 billion in grant funding for various types of health research, including clinical trials, developing medicines and other functions.
