US president-elect Joe Biden’s 13-member Covid task force team has two Indian-Americans - Vivek Murthy and Atul Gawande. Murthy is the co-chair of the unit.
Biden has named more than 20 Indian-Americans as members, including three as team leads, to his agency review teams (ARTs) that will evaluate the operations of the key federal agencies in the current administration to ensure smooth transfer of power.
More than half of the ART members are women, and around 40 per cent represent communities historically underrepresented in the federal government in the US.
Murthy, 43, served under the Barack Obama administration. He was the US surgeon general between 2014-17, and commanded the public health force that dealt with the Ebola, Zika and Flint water crisis.
Born in Huddersfield in the UK to immigrant doctors from Karnataka, the former vice-admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps studied in Harvard. In 2003, Murthy earned an MD from Yale School of Medicine and an MBA from Yale School of Management.
Gawande, 55, is a professor of surgery at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and at Harvard Medical School. He also has administrative experience, having served as a senior adviser in the health department during the Bill Clinton tenure.
A Rhodes scholar and a Harvard alumnus, Gawande was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Indian immigrants to the US.
Gawande earned a bachelor's degree in biology and political science from Stanford University in 1987. As a Rhodes Scholar, he bagged an MA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from Balliol College, Oxford, in 1989. He completed his general surgical residency training, again at Harvard, in 2003. He entered medical school in 1990 – leaving after two years to become Clinton's healthcare lieutenant during the 1992 campaign.
Gawande also served for two years as the CEO of Boston-based Haven Healthcare that was formed by billionaire investor Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos, and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon.
Apart from Murthy and Gawande another prominent name in Biden's team is Stanford University's Arun Majumdar who is the team lead for the department of energy ART.
Rahul Gupta is the team lead for office of national drug control policy and Kiran Ahuja has been named team lead for office of personnel management.
The other Indian-Americans in Biden's team are Puneet Talwar, Pav Singh, Arun Venkatraman, Pravina Raghavan, Atman Trivedi, Shital Shah, R Ramesh, Rama Zakaria, Subhasri Ramanathan, Raj De, Seema Nanda, Raj Nayak, Reena Aggarwal, Satyam Khanna, Bhavya Lal, Dilpreet Sidhu, Divya Kumaraiah, Kumar Chandran and Aneesh Chopra.
Moglai Bap and Mo Chara of Kneecap perform at Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, Britain, June 28, 2025. REUTERS/Jaimi Joy
Police may probe anti-Israel comments at Glastonbury
BRITISH police said they were considering whether to launch an investigation after performers at Glastonbury Festival made anti-Israel comments during their shows.
"We are aware of the comments made by acts on the West Holts Stage at Glastonbury Festival this afternoon," Avon and Somerset Police, in western England, said on X late on Saturday (28).
Irish hip-hop group Kneecap and punk duo Bob Vylan made anti-Israeli chants in separate shows on the West Holts stage on Saturday. One of the members of Bob Vylan chanted "Death, death, to the IDF" in a reference to the Israel Defense Forces.
"Video evidence will be assessed by officers to determine whether any offences may have been committed that would require a criminal investigation," the police statement said.
The Israeli Embassy in Britain said it was "deeply disturbed by the inflammatory and hateful rhetoric expressed on stage at the Glastonbury Festival".
Prime minister Keir Starmer said earlier this month it was "not appropriate" for Kneecap to appear at Glastonbury.
The band's frontman Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh was charged with a terrorism offence last month for allegedly displaying a flag in support of Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah at a concert in November. He has denied the charge.
A British government minister said it was appalling that the anti-Israel chants had been made at Glastonbury, and that the festival's organisers and the BBC broadcaster - which is showing the event - had questions to answer.
Health secretary Wes Streeting said he was also appalled by violence committed by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
"I'd also say to the Israeli Embassy, get your own house in order in terms of the conduct of your own citizens and the settlers in the West Bank," Streeting told Sky News.
"I wish they'd take the violence of their own citizens towards Palestinians more seriously," he said.
(Reuters)