By Ahmed Aboulenein and Julie Steenhuysen
WASHINGTON, May 21 (Reuters) – The acting director of the U.S. NIH’s infectious disease institute has stepped down, two Democratic senators said on Thursday during a Senate hearing, even as the United States scrambles to respond to Ebola and hantavirus outbreaks.
Jeffery Taubenberger became acting director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in April 2025 after President Donald Trump’s administration pushed out the previous head.
Senator Tammy Baldwin opened the hearing on the National Institutes of Health’s 2027 budget by saying that Taubenberger had stepped down and would not testify as planned. Senator Patty Murray also mentioned Taubenberger’s departure.
NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya, a Trump appointee, in his own testimony and responses to questions from lawmakers did not dispute the departure, saying that the institute needs new leadership because it will no longer focus on civilian biodefense.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the NIH, did not respond to questions on Taubenberger’s exit or the NIAID’s role in Ebola response efforts.
“In the midst of an emerging Ebola outbreak, we have a leadership vacuum at the world’s premier infectious disease institute and across our health agencies. This is of great concern,” Baldwin said.
Under former director Anthony Fauci, NIAID played a leading role in the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
Bhattacharya said NIAID had focused on civilian biodefense – meaning preventing and preparing for threats like biological attacks and pandemics – for years but that the Trump administration wanted to shift its focus to infectious diseases when they emerge, such as Ebola and hantavirus, and also prioritize allergy and immunology.
“That shift means that we need some new leadership,” he said, adding that departing NIAID staff had been assigned to other roles at NIH.
Jeanne Marrazzo, who was fired as the head of NIAID by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said in an interview that it is very concerning that “the world’s premier biomedical research institute” does not appear to be working with researchers and industry to develop treatments to address the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The exits add to the leadership vacuum at the world’s largest public funder of biomedical research, with more than half of the NIH’s 27 institutes led by acting directors. NIAID is the agency’s second largest institute, with a budget of over $6.5 billion.
There are no confirmed cases in the United States of the Andes hantavirus that killed three people in an outbreak aboard a luxury cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocean this month. But 41 people, including 18 quarantined in Nebraska, are being monitored for possible infection.
(Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein in Washington and Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; editing by Caroline Humer and Will Dunham)
