New Delhi: Six former US surgeons general wrote a stinging op-ed in The Washington Post Tuesday, attacking the policy actions of the Trump administration, particularly Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. They said they had taken an oath to protect Americans from health dangers and were once again compelled to issue a warning. Among them was Vivek Murthy, who is of Indian descent, and has served as US Surgeon General under both Democratic and Republican governments.
“Science and expertise have taken a back seat to ideology and misinformation. Morale has plummeted in our health agencies, and talent is fleeing at a time when we face rising threats — from resurgent infectious diseases to worsening chronic illnesses,” said the article, titled, ‘It’s our duty to warn the nation about RFK Jr’.
Along with Murthy, the statement was signed by Jerome Adams, Richard Carmona, Joycelyn Elders, Antonia Novello, and David Satcher, all of them united in their “increasing alarm”. The Surgeon General of the United States serves as the operational head of the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and holds the rank of vice admiral.
For Murthy, public health has been a lifelong calling. He has attributed his interest in medicine to his parents’ small clinic in Miami, where he saw them care for patients’ physical and emotional needs.
“All these experiences did not seem to come together until I became Surgeon General,” he once said during a visit to the National Institutes of Health.
Born in Huddersfield, England, to Indian parents from Karnataka, he moved to Miami when he was three. He studied at Miami Palmetto Senior High School, did his undergraduate studies from Harvard, and in 1998, was awarded the Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship to pursue his MD at Yale University. He also completed an MBA there. After his residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, he joined Harvard’s faculty as a physician in internal medicine.
He rose to the public eye in 2008 when he helped launch Doctors for Obama, a group of around 10,000 physicians who campaigned for Barack Obama’s presidential bid. The group later became Doctors for America, which Murthy went on to lead.
He was appointed the 19th US Surgeon General by Barack Obama in 2014, briefly stayed on under Donald Trump, and returned to the post when Joe Biden took office. Through it all, he also maintained links to India.
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Trump, Biden years
After Donald Trump came to power in 2016, Murthy was asked to resign. When he refused, he was removed from his post in April 2017. But in 2021, President Joe Biden reappointed him as the 21st Surgeon General and head of the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
During his first term, Murthy helped steer the country through health crises such as Ebola and the Zika virus. He also released a “landmark report” on drug and alcohol addiction, compiling national data on substance use.
In 2016, he sent a letter to 2.3 million healthcare professionals urging them to take collective action against the opioid epidemic — the first time a US Surgeon General had directly called on medical practitioners in such a way.
“Many clinicians have told me they weren’t aware of just how bad the problem had gotten. Many were not aware of the connection between the epidemic and prescribing habits,” he told CNN at the time.
A vocal advocate of vaccines, Murthy started a campaign featuring Elmo from Sesame Street to help parents and children understand the importance of vaccination. Earlier in his career, he conducted laboratory research on vaccine development and studied the participation of women and minorities in clinical trials. His findings have been published in Science, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
Under his ‘Make America Healthy Again’ agenda, Kennedy has repeatedly spoken out against vaccines.
In their op-ed, Murthy and his counterparts wrote: “Kennedy has spent decades advancing dangerous and discredited claims about vaccines — most notoriously, the thoroughly discredited theory that childhood vaccines cause autism.”
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Projects in India
Murthy was not born in India but has spoken about his family’s roots in Karnataka and the stories his father told him about their village.
On X in January, he shared a ‘Parting Prescription’ for America, in which he wrote about how his father never felt “empty” until he left India despite all the struggles there.
“It was a remarkable statement from a man who grew up with no running water or electricity, and whose family scarcely had enough money to put food on the table each night. Yet what they lacked in wealth, they made up for in community,” he wrote.
Murthy has maintained connections with his ancestral homeland. He is the co-founder of VISIONS, an HIV/AIDS education programme in India and the US. As president of the initiative for eight years, Murthy helped expand it to reach thousands of young people across both countries. He also co-founded the Swasthya Project, a community health partnership in rural India that trained women as healthcare providers and educators and brought direct medical services to thousands of residents.
In 2023, Murthy’s family began building a spiritual centre in their native village of Hallegere in Mandya district. An 11-foot statue of “Mother of Earth”, described as a symbol of unity, will be carved out of a single piece of rock. The Rs 70-crore project, spread over 12 acres, will include a Yoga and Meditation Sathwik Centre on eight acres of land.
Murthy is also an advocate of mental well-being. He has often discussed the dangers of loneliness and the overuse of social media, emphasising the importance of community and human connection. His 2020 book Together: Why Social Connection Holds the Key to Better Health, Higher Performance, and Greater Happiness was a New York Times bestseller.
In a post on X, he once listed his life goals: “Know yourself. Be yourself. Love yourself.”
(Edited by Asavari Singh)