Monday, September 17, 2001

While I was at DHHS for the smallpox meetings, Secretary Thompson called me in his office and said that although he had said that he would not ask me again to be NIH Director unless I brought it up, he said that he had to do so now since “…the country needs me, particularly during these stressful times. I want you very much and President Bush wants me very much”. Although I had been resisting this for months (and years) (see above), I felt that I could not refuse this call to duty. Thompson said to name my conditions. I wrote them down and deliver them to him the next day on Sept. 18. The conditions were: 1) Dual roles as NIH Director and NIAID Director; 2) Additional staff; 3) Direct access to him; 4) Good faith discussions regarding plans that he has to do administrative restructuring (centralizing) at NIH OD and away from the individual institutes such as budget, human resources, etc. I felt that particularly budget and to a lesser extent HR centralization would not work; 5) $300,000.00 salary ; 6) Continue to do editing with royalties (especially HPIM) and remain on Board of Trustees of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. The Secretary agreed on all of these except he decreased the salary number to $295,000.00. I told him that I accept the offer. He will send all of this to the White House to clear that they also accept these conditions. I do not expect anything to happen soon given that we are headed to war and likely additional terrorist attacks.