Moncef Slaoui, the chief adviser to Operation Warp Speed, on Wednesday unveiled his resignation as part of a plan to deliver the vaccination effort to President-elect Biden’s coronavirus team.
Slaoui’s resignation, which will take effect next month according to CNBC, comes as the president-elect has not yet appointed a new chief scientific adviser to the federal government’s vaccine deployment program, which he has so far seen as just over nine million Americans receive the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Representatives of the Biden transition team did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill.
The president-elect has appointed Jeffrey Zients, appointed business executive and former director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to oversee his response to COVID-19, while Kaiser Permanente’s head of health, Bechara Chouchair, is the coordinator of the Biden vaccine.
Slaoui previously indicated that he would step down once two vaccines against COVID-19 hit the market, a milestone that was reached last month. Last week he told Politico he had expanded his plans to continue until Biden’s team no longer needed his help.
“I have decided to expand it in order to ensure that the operation continues to operate in the same way that it has operated through the transition of the administration,” Slaoui told reporters.
An official from Biden’s transition team also told Politico that Slaoui would temporarily continue “to ensure the continuity of the work that has already been done and ensure a smooth process.”
General Gustave Perna said in the statement during the same conversation that the Biden team did not ask him to stop monitoring the country’s vaccine distribution efforts.
“I’ve signed up, I’m here until I finish my part of the mission or they tell me otherwise,” he said.