Exclusive: Dr. Jay Bhattacharya on How the NIH Is Rethinking Autism, DEI, China Ties, and Gain-of-Function

Feb 11, 2026

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, physician, former Stanford professor and NIH director reforming biomedical research. He discusses reshaping NIH priorities toward health impact, rethinking China partnerships and audit rules, pausing suspect gain-of-function grants, confronting replication failures, and shifting funding away from politicized DEI programs to reproducible, high-impact science.

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ADVICE

Mandate Risk Calculations For Dangerous Work

Require calculation of catastrophic risk for experiments and hold investigators and institutions accountable for reporting it.
Route high‑risk proposals to an independent expert board to accept or reject funding.

INSIGHT

Gaps In Past Oversight Revealed

Previously the oversight process rarely escalated risky studies; only a few projects were ever sent for high‑level review.
NIH paused ~40 grants that might require independent board review while White House policy is finalized.

INSIGHT

Gatekeeping Hurt Pandemic Inquiry

The Proximal Origins paper distorted public debate and suppressed lab‑origin inquiry, harming scientific credibility.
Bhattacharya calls for reform in how scientific claims are communicated and gatekept.

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In this no-holds-barred interview, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health, breaks down how the world’s largest public funder of biomedical research is changing under his leadership.

Bhattacharya, a former professor of Stanford University, public health expert, and coauthor of the anti-lockdown Great Barrington Declaration, was sworn in as director of the NIH in April last year.

With an annual budget of almost $50 billion, the NIH sets the direction of research at universities, medical centers, and research institutes across America.

It encompasses 27 institutes and centers that cover different areas of health and employ some 20,000 people. One of those is the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which was headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci for nearly 40 years.

The NIH, Bhattacharya told me, “really hasn’t had a change in leadership in decades. ... We’ve had new directors, but the fundamental structure and direction of the NIH has been basically the same until last year.”

Bhattacharya says his top priority is to end the practice of “funding the scientific enterprise for the sake of funding science” and ensure that NIH-funded scientific research actually produces better health outcomes for the American people. The goal should be improvements in health and longevity, not just more scientific papers, he says.

During our interview, we covered a lot of ground, including:

-Has the NIH completely stopped funding gain-of-function research?

-Is the NIH continuing to fund research with China?

-How has funding for international research institutes been restructured?

-Has the NIH stopped funding all research grants related to diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives?

-What is being done to reverse the politicization of science?

-What is the NIH doing to help those who suffered injuries from the mandated COVID-19 mRNA vaccines?

-What can the NIH do to alleviate the massive replication crisis in research?

-How does he view the controversy surrounding vaccines and autism? Is the NIH looking into potential links?

-How is the NIH restructuring the allocation of funding?

What America needs, Bhattacharya told me, is a “second scientific revolution,” saying: “The NIH has the capacity to induce that second scientific revolution. That’s what I’m going to work toward for the next few years.”

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.