Elias Zerhouni personifies the American dream. He arrived in the U.S. from Algeria as a young man with a couple of hundred dollars in his pocket. Talent, ambition and hard work propelled him into a successful academic career. In 2002, he was nominated and confirmed as NIH director, and later he served in senior positions in the biopharma industry. That trajectory “would be almost impossible” today, he told BioCentury Washington Editor Steve Usdin on The BioCentury Show.
Anti-immigration policies, underfunding of basic research, and attacks on philanthropy have made the U.S. an unattractive destination for anyone hoping to follow his path, Zerhouni said.
Zerhouni also discussed reasons for optimism about life sciences in the U.S., the difficulty of fixing drug pricing, and his time at Sanofi.

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01:09 - The American Dream & Science
05:51 - Zerhouni at NIH
09:40 - Loss of Trust
16:53 - Vaccine Policy
20:12 - Zerhouni in Industry
23:20 - Drug Pricing