Two Democratic senators announced during a Senate hearing that Jeffery Taubenberger, who had been serving as acting director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has stepped down and will not appear to testify as previously scheduled. The announcement came during testimony on the National Institutes of Health's 2027 budget.
Senator Tammy Baldwin opened the session by saying Taubenberger had left his post. Senator Patty Murray echoed the report. NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya, a Trump appointee, did not dispute the senators' statements in his testimony and in responses to lawmakers' questions, and said the institute requires new leadership as it will no longer concentrate on civilian biodefense.
Taubenberger had been named acting director in April 2025 after the Trump administration removed the prior head of NIAID. In his hearing remarks, Bhattacharya described a shift in priorities - away from a prolonged emphasis on civilian biodefense, which he defined as prevention and preparation for biological attacks and pandemics - toward responding to infectious diseases when they emerge, including Ebola and hantavirus, and toward a renewed emphasis on allergy and immunology.
"That shift means that we need some new leadership," Bhattacharya said, and he added that staff who left NIAID had been reassigned to other positions across the NIH.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the NIH, did not respond to inquiries about Taubenberger's departure or about the role NIAID is playing in response efforts for the Ebola outbreak.
Senator Baldwin warned of the potential consequences of the change at a time of active outbreaks, saying, "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." The concern underscores heightened scrutiny of public health preparedness while outbreaks are unfolding.
Under former director Anthony Fauci, NIAID had been central to the United States' responses to major public health crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The institute remains the NIH’s second-largest, with a budget exceeding $6.5 billion.
Jeanne Marrazzo, who was fired as head of NIAID by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said in an interview that it is worrisome that "the world’s premier biomedical research institute" does not appear to be collaborating with researchers and industry to develop treatments for the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The recent departures add to a broader pattern of interim leadership at the National Institutes of Health. More than half of the NIH's 27 institutes are currently led by acting directors, creating what some lawmakers and observers describe as a leadership vacuum at the world's largest public funder of biomedical research.
Separately, U.S. officials say there are no confirmed cases in the United States of the Andes hantavirus that has been linked to the deaths of three people in an outbreak aboard a luxury cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocean this month. Nonetheless, 41 people are being monitored for possible infection, including 18 individuals who are quarantined in Nebraska.
Contextual details and implications
- NIAID is the NIH’s second-largest institute with a budget of over $6.5 billion.
- More than half of the NIH’s 27 institutes presently have acting directors, reflecting broader leadership turnover within the agency.
- Officials report no confirmed U.S. cases of the Andes hantavirus tied to the cruise ship incident, though dozens are under monitoring and some are quarantined.