Ashish Jha, the White House Covid response coordinator, is leaving the Biden administration this month for a top position at Brown University.
Jha, who has overseen the administration's pandemic strategy since early 2022, will return to Brown as dean of the university's School of Public Health on July 1, the school said in a statement.
We are in a world drastically changed by the COVID-19 pandemic, he said. For all we have accomplished to reduce illness and save lives, COVID-19 has exposed the weaknesses in our public health and health care systems. I look forward to returning to Brown to continue our groundbreaking work transforming public health education, research and practice to convert these weaknesses to strengths. Jha's departure, which has already been reported by the Wall Street Journal, comes just a month after the Biden administration ended the national emergency and public health emergency tied to the Covid pandemic. In May, the WHO declared an end to the global health crisis.
As a leading public health expert in America, President Joe Biden said, Jha has effectively translated and communicated complex scientific challenges into concrete actions that saved and improved the lives of millions of Americans. In March 2022, Biden appointed Jha as the Covid response coordinator, replacing Jeff Zients, who became Biden's second White House chief of staff. At that point, the U.S. was still grappling with Covid cases from new strains of the virus.