Reported by Howard Kurtz at the Washington Post yesterday, Obama administration officials have announced that Dr. Sanjay Gupta of CNN and CBS news fame has been offered the job of Surgeon General of the United States.

Is Dr. Gupta going to leave behind the teleprompters and exotic locations for medical reporting for gritty Washington politics? Kurtz says that he has already told officials that he wants the job, so it’s more or less a done deal, one that is likely to make him one of the highest profile Surgeons General in history. Not only that, but he’s also likely to weigh in on policy. Where will he stand on bioethics questions? Hard to tell, so far as a journalist, he’s reported on the facts. Now, with healthcare certain to be at the forefront of the weeks away Obama administration, Dr. Gupta gets to have an opinion and make an impact.

Summer Johnson, PhD