Giroir stepping down as COVID-19 testing czar; plus Gilead, Sanofi Ventures, Varian, Sirtex and Oxford BioMedica

Brett Giroir, who was appointed in March to coordinate the U.S.’s COVID-19 testing efforts, will be “demobilized” from his post mid-June and return to his previous position as assistant secretary for health and head of the Public Health Service. An HHS spokesperson told BioCentury that “many of the day-to-day management and operations of testing are being transitioned to HHS operating divisions under the leadership of the Immediate Office of the Secretary” (see “U.S. Moves to Unlock COVID-19 Test Capacity”).

Gilead Sciences Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD) said Mark Genovese has joined as SVP, inflammation, a therapeutic space in which the company plans to expand its presence. Genovese has been a professor of immunology and rheumatology at Stanford University, where he established a clinical research program focused on translational medicine in autoimmune diseases and led investigator-initiated studies and multicenter trials for therapies in rheumatological diseases, including arthritis...