Sanjay Gupta

CNN Chief Medical Correspondent (since 2001)

Why He Matters

A practicing neurosurgeon whose photogenic smile and easy manner made him one of CNN's most popular correspondents, Gupta was reportedly being vetted for the surgeon general post under President Barack Obama, but withdrew his name in March 2009, citing a desire to continue his surgical practice and spend time with his young family.

Gupta had little political experience, but his proponents hoped he would raise the profile of the "nation's doctor" in order to fight the obesity epidemic and help push Obama's health-care reform proposals.

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Background

At a Glance

Career History: White House Fellow (1997-1998); Great Lakes Brain and Spine Institute, partner, (2000-2001)
Birthday: October 23, 1969
Hometown: Michigan
Alma Mater: University of Michigan and University of Michigan Medical Center, B.S. and M.D., 1992

Spouse: Rebecca Olson Gupta
Religion: Hindu
Email
Website

Path to Power

Gupta was born in Michigan in 1969 to Subhash and Damyanti, who had immigrated to America from southwest Asia in the mid-sixties.

His mother Damyanti, who was born in a part of India that is now Pakistan, was the first woman engineer hired by Ford Motor Company, where his father Subhash also worked as an engineer.

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At 17, Gupta entered the accelerated six-year medical program at the University of Michigan, where he graduated with both a bachelor's degree and a doctorate in medicine in 1992. He had his first brush with combining medicine and journalism when he wrote a student newspaper article on implied consent to organ donation.

Gupta stayed in Michigan to complete his residency in neurosurgery at the University of Michigan Medical Center, followed by a fellowship in neurosurgery at the University of Tennessee's Semmes-Murphy clinic.

Gupta "has always been drawn to health policy," according to The Washington Post.

In 1997, Gupta was chosen as one of 15 White House fellows and spent a year as a special adviser to then-First Lady Clinton, "writing speeches and helping her formulate policies," according to CNN. Clinton even mentioned him in her 2003 autobiography.

As a White House fellow, Gupta worked with future politicos, including 2004 congressional candidates Jamie Metzl (D) and Jon P. Jennings (D), as well as former congressman Brad Carson (D-Okla.), who is still a friend.

"Gupta 'worked quite closely with' Clinton on health care and other issues, and studied the failure of the administration's failed health care reform effort," Carson told The Politico.

His year at the White House opened Gupta up to the possibility of "delivering health care messages in ways other than the doctor's office," he told TVWeek in 2007.

In 1998, CNN president and former Lyndon Johnson official Tom Johnson was overhauling the network's medical unit. Gupta was offered the chance to work there, according to TVWeek, but instead chose to return to Michigan. "I really wanted to go home and practice neurosurgery," he said.

In 2000, he became a partner at the Great Lakes Brain and Spine Institute in Flint, Mich.

CNN Career

By the summer of 2001, Gupta was ready to make the move to Atlanta to join CNN. He also joined the neurosurgery staff at Emory University's Grady Memorial Hospital, Atlanta's main public hospital. He told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he thought he'd be working mostly off-the-air at CNN, but he quickly became one of the network's stars.

At the start of the 2003 Iraq War, he travelled from Kuwait to Baghdad as an embedded journalist with the Navy's "Devil Docs" medical unit. The Devil Docs didn't have a neurosurgeon, so Gupta himself performed neurosurgery on an injured Iraqi child. In all, he performed five neurosurgeries while embedded, drawing some criticism from journalism ethics groups who said he blurred the line between reporting the story and becoming the story.

Gupta also reported from a Kuwaiti shopping mall that had been hit by a low-flying missile.

He has since traveled to Bangkok and Sri Lanka to report on the AIDS epidemic, as well as reporting live from South Asia in the wake of the 2004 tsunami and from New Orleans after 2005's Hurricane Katrina.

Even as his star rose at CNN, Gupta remained on the staff at Emory University Medical School. He still sees patients at Grady Memorial Hospital, where he is associate chief of neurosurgery. "I like being in here," Gupta told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution of the operating room where he spends every Monday performing surgeries.

On May 15, 2004, Gupta married Atlanta family law attorney Rebecca Olson. Then-CNN anchor Bill Hemmer was a groomsman.The couple now has three young children.

In 2006, Gupta began contributing to CBS shows including "CBS Evening News with Katie Couric," and "60 Minutes," while still keeping his jobs at CNN, Grady and Emory.

Gupta's packed schedule and energizer-bunny attitude are famous. By 2008, he was leading CNN's breaking medical news coverage, appearing regularly on CNN's "American Morning," with frequent appearances on "Anderson Cooper 360," anchoring his own half-hour weekend show called "House Call with Dr. Sanjay Gupta," anchoring the health show "Vital Signs" for CNN International and reporting for CNN documentaries. He also reported for CBS shows, wrote columns and blog-posts for Time Magazine, CNN.com and CNNHealth.com, co-hosted "Accent Health" on the Turner Private Networks, recorded a weekly podcast called "Paging Dr. Gupta," and taped medical segments to be shown during TNT's re-runs of the television show "ER."

In January 2009, he was announced as Obama's first choice for the post of surgeon general, the nation's most high-profile public health post. Gupta would have headed the Office of Public and Health Service under the Health and Human Services Department, including leading the 6,000-member Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service. (CNN released a statement saying Gupta had not been assigned to report on health-care policy or other matters involving the new administration since notifying the network about his discussions with the Obama team.)

The surgeon general is primarily a health educator, translating the best scientific information into useful programs and advice for staying healthy. And, as the Wall Street Journal asked, "In this media-saturated era, who could do that better than a doc who's famous for explaining health issues on cable TV?"

In spite of that, Gupta faced a slew of criticism from consumer groups who questioned his credentials, just as Health and Human Services secretary-designate Tom Daschle withdrew his name over tax problems.

After the dust settled, Obama nominated Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to head HHS in March 2009. Later the same week, Gupta reportedly withdrew his name from consideration for the surgeon general post.

The Issues

Gupta's rumored appointment had experts wondering what part a celebrity-surgeon-general could play in Obama's health care reform efforts.

After Gupta's initial meeting with Obama, the neurosurgeon also met with his potential future boss, HHS nominee Tom Daschle, The Washington Post reported.

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The Washington Post reported that Gupta's appointment as surgeon general would come with a second post in the new White House Office of Health Reform, run by Daschle with deputy Jeanne Lambrew. Gupta could serve as an influential M.D. and a powerful public advocate for an Obama health plan.

Before his name was floated for surgeon general, Gupta weighed in on the health-care issue in a December 4, 2008 CNN blog post entitled, "Extreme Challenges: How Obama should address health care." (Gupta had reportedly met with the president-elect in late November.) "The next administration will be faced with extreme challenges and health care reform has to be front and center," Gupta wrote. "You can't really fix the economy without addressing health care. Still, this reporter is optimistic we will see some changes over the next few years. Heck, the next administration might even deal with stem cells and obesity to boot."

The Credibility Gap

As surgeon general, Gupta would lead the 6,000-member Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service. But representatives of the Corps say Gupta could face a "credibility gap."

"I am unaware of any public health experience or qualifications he has to be the leader of the nation's public health service," Gerard M. Farrell, executive director of the service's Commissioned Officers Association, told The Washington Post. "This would be akin to appointing the Army chief of staff from the city council of Hoboken," N.J, he said.

Gupta's rumored nomination drew fire from House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.). Only a few days after the news of Gupta's name hit the airwaves, Conyers wrote a January 8, 2009, letter to his congressional colleagues, saying, "It is not in the best interests of the nation to have someone like this who lacks the requisite experience needed to oversee the federal agency that provides crucial health care assistance to some of the poorest and most underserved communities in America."

In a January 8 e-mail, Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), which promotes universal health care paid by a single government entity, urged its members to email Obama to request a more qualified candidate. The PNHP also said Gupta's criticism of the Michael Moore film, Sicko, (see below) suggested he was not in favor of single-payer health insurance.

The Sicko Controversy

In 2007, Gupta got into a public battle with filmmaker Michael Moore over Moore's film, Sicko. The film, a scathing criticism of the U.S. health-insurance system, praised countries where the government paid health-care costs for every citizen. Moore even brought sick U.S. patients to a Havana hospital for treatment.

In a CNN report, Gupta said Moore "fudged the facts" about health-care costs and cherry-picked his numbers. Gupta said Moore's film claimed that Cuba spent about $25-per-citizen on health costs each year, while the real number was actually $229. Moore's film had actually placed the number at $251. CNN apologized and blamed Gupta's error on a transcription typo.

Adding flame to the fire was Gupta's choice for his fact-checker, Paul Keckley. In an on-air debate with Moore on Larry King Live, Gupta claimed that the health expert worked only for Vanderbilt University. In fact, Keckley had left Vanderbilt a few months before. He worked for Deloitte Center for Health Solutions, chaired by Tommy Thompson, a Republican who was George W. Bush's Health and Human Services secretary. Keckley had also made large donations to Republican causes.

CNN apologized for the two errors on-air and in a statement.

Universal Health Care

In a December 2008 CNN blog post entitled, "Extreme Challenges: How Obama should address health care," Gupta wrote, "Too many people are uninsured, and even more have insurance that is simply inadequate."

"Roughly 22,000 people die each year due to lack of coverage," he went on. "For sake of reference, the number of people who die annually from homicide in the United States is around 17,000. It would seem being uninsured is a different sort of homicide."

He said health care reform has to be "front and center" in the new administration, saying "you can't really fix the economy without addressing health care." Noting that many families spend more money on health care than on food, he said as the economy worsened, people were cutting back on doctor-visits and prescription medications.

He said the biggest challenge Obama would face was "a perception one. To remind people the economy and health care reforms are truly linked."

In a February 1, 2008, "Paging Dr. Gupta" CNN blog post entitled, "Learning from universal health care proposals," Gupta responded to health-care talk in Barack Obama's debate with Hillary Rodham Clinton the night before. Gupta commented on the California legislature's recent rejection of a bill to mandate health insurance coverage for all citizens, which was similar to a law enacted in Massachusetts in 2006. Gupta avoided taking sides on the issue: "I find it interesting the two states that put forward concrete universal health care plans, a core Democratic issue, were both led by Republican governors - Mitt Romney in Massachusetts and [Arnold] Schwarzenegger in California."

"While more people than ever are covered in Massachusetts, the cost overruns have been more than $400 million," he added.

In an episode of his weekly show "House Call with Dr. Sanjay Gupta," the eponymous doctor looked into the high cost of health-care, even for those with jobs. "Problems with the health care system aren't limited to the uninsured," Gupta said. "People who have health care, even employer sponsored plans, are seeing these huge cost increases."

Obesity and Wellness

Gupta is particularly passionate about preventing obesity, especially childhood obesity. Many of his one-hour CNN specials focus on eating well and exercising to combat America's obesity epidemic. In his September 2007 special, "Fed Up: America's Killer Diet," Gupta investigated how common American foods affect health. "If you look closely, the way we eat is truly shocking," he said on the show.

Gupta launched "Fit Nation," an online program that encourages viewers to lose weight using a Web site and Gupta's television appearances.

This interest could have fit in well with projects the surgeon general's office had already been working on. Outgoing Surgeon General Rear Admiral Steven K. Galson spent much of 2008 touring the country to promote awareness of the dangers of childhood obesity.

Presidential Health

Although it's not in the surgeon general's job description, Gupta could have a positive influence on the health of the commander-in-chief. During the 2008 presidential campaign year, he reported the CNN documentaries "Fit to Lead," about the health of various presidential candidates, and "First Patient" about the strain running the country puts on the president's health.

The Network

Gupta was a special adviser to Hillary Rodham Clinton as a 1997 to 1998 White House fellow. According to CNN he advised Clinton on health-care policy, including helping her write speeches. His co-fellows that year included 2004 congressional candidates Jamie Metzl (D) and Jon P. Jennings (D), as well as former congressman Brad Carson (D-Okla.).

Gupta is a member of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the Congress of Neurological Surgeons and the Council of Foreign Relations. He is a board member of the Lance Armstrong LiveStrong Foundation.

Campaign Contributions

Gupta donated money to Democratic candidates in the past, most recently giving $2,000 each to Jon Paul Jennings, Jamie Metzl and Brad Carson, all in 2003. All three candidates worked as White House fellows with Gupta in 1997.

There is no record of Gupta giving donations to any candidates in the 2008 presidential race, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

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