The cabinet secretary, with the agreement of the Prime Minister, has announced that Professor Chris Whitty has been appointed as the new chief medical officer for England and the UK Government’s chief medical adviser. He will replace Professor Dame Sally Davies, the current CMO, when she takes up her role as master of Trinity College Cambridge in October 2019.
Professor Whitty is a consultant in infectious diseases at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases and in acute medicine at University College Hospital. He has been chief scientific adviser at the Department of Health and Social Care since 2016, and is also a professor of public and international health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Professor Whitty will continue to lead the National Institute for Health Research for the foreseeable future, and commented: “It is a great honour to follow in the footsteps of Dame Sally. I am delighted that I will be able to combine the position of CMO with my role at NIHR, and look forward to continuing to lead NIHR’s remarkable work in supporting research which improves the health and wealth of the nation.”
