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A United States State Department science envoy quit yesterday in protest over US President Donald Trump’s pullout from the Paris climate accord and defensive comments after violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. But according to a press report, Peter Hotez, a past science adviser who has been a featured speaker of a UN agency and pharmaceutical industry group in Geneva, is stepping up to offer his services without concern for Trump’s actions.

According to a report by the Guardian, Daniel Kammen sent a letter of resignation yesterday with the first letters of each paragraph spelling out “IMPEACH”. Kammen, one of three State Department science envoys, is a professor at the University of California Berkeley, and director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory (RAEL).

“Your actions to date have, sadly, harmed the quality of life in the United States, our standing abroad, and the sustainability of the planet,” he wrote.

On Hotez, the Guardian said:

“Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Texas, served as envoy in 2015 and 2016 and said he has been in contact with the state department about possibly returning. He would be willing to do so even after Trump’s post-Charlottesville statements, he told Reuters on Wednesday.”

“’Despite those comments I think it’s important to be willing to serve the United States,’ Hotez said.”

“Trump’s comments sparked a wave of defections of chief executives from White House advisory councils, leading to their disbanding, and earned condemnations from Republicans and Democrats alike,” the Guardian said. Departing CEOs included the head of a large pharmaceutical company.

[Update:] A spokesperson from the Baylor College of Medicine has clarified to Intellectual Property Watch: “Dr. Hotez’s focus was on discussing his role as a US Science Envoy and the importance of vaccine diplomacy throughout the world. His focus was not to discuss either administration, but solely to talk about the role of US Science Envoy under any administration.”

Also, a representative for the IFPMA clarified that Hotez was not and is not an adviser to the industry group, but was simply an invited speaker.  [end update]

Hotez was the keynote speaker at the Geneva-based International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA) 2016 General Assembly. He also was a featured speaker at an event in 2015 of the Global Challenges Division at the UN World Intellectual Property Organization and was the subject of 2016 laudatory feature interview in the WIPO Magazine, in both cases recognised for his expertise in neglected tropical diseases.

Hotez has also been the head of a WIPO Advisory Committee established in 2016 to guide the expansion of WIPO Re:Search over 5 years, according to an Intellectual Property Watch interview with Jennifer Dent, president of BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH).

Intellectual Property Watch also has written about Hotez’s views on neglected tropical diseases (IPW, WIPO, 2 November 2015).

Hotez was not reached for comment by press time.