Former top public health official Dr. Howard Zucker has sounded the alarm that public health in the Trump administration is headed in a dangerous direction after the ousting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director and the resignation of other top agency officials.
It comes after the White House fired Susan Moneraz from the top position, just weeks into the job, when she refused to bow to pressure from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr.
Moneraz’s lawyers accused the department of “weaponizing public health for political gain” under RFK Jr. and putting lives at risk as they pushed back on her ousting on Wednesday night. They said Moneraz refused to “rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives.”
At least three top CDC officials announced their resignations, citing the undermining of science, political attacks, and outside pressure.
“My concern is that politics is taking over science, and it is a dangerous path that we are headed down,” Zucker warned in an interview with The Daily Beast on Thursday.
Zucker previously served as the Deputy Director for Global Health at the CDC and as commissioner for the New York State Department of Health.
“When political decisions are eclipsing science, it puts a nation at risk for some serious problems when it comes to public health,” Zucker said. “It has happened with this issue of vaccines, and I am concerned it may happen with other issues.”
Amid turmoil at the agency, Zucker hailed the experts and staff working to do their jobs despite the challenges they faced. However, he warned that without directors to protect them, the scientists will be exposed to the pressures that may come from Washington.
“Those individuals who are extremely seasoned in what they do may not be as seasoned in managing some of these political issues,” he said.
Zucker encouraged the experts and scientists at the CDC to maintain their scientific credibility “by presenting the facts and the data to whomever needs to hear it” and said he hoped the now vacant roles would be filled with those who can remain unbiased and not bow to pressures.
He also emphasized that he still trusted the information being put out by the agency, specifically mentioning flu season data as an example. He fears that the administration’s decision not to share information down the line could ultimately create a void.
Zucker is not the only former public health official sounding alarms.
Former Acting CDC Director Richard Besser, who is now CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, said Moneraz was a last line of defense against the Trump administration’s dangerous agenda. He praised her during a Thursday press conference as a “strongly principled scientist” and applauded her pushback on Kennedy.
“I fear now that Secretary Kennedy will now be even further emboldened to issue the same reckless directives that Dr. Moneraz rightly refused to rubber-stamp,” he said. He noted that he had spoken to her on Wednesday.
“Our entire country will be left vulnerable should this agenda move forward and Kennedy limits who can access which lifesaving vaccines,” Besser said.
He called the situation with so many center directors resigning at once the “wild, wild west.” He blasted Kennedy for demonizing public health leaders, suggesting that it may come down to turning to strong state systems for guidance that once came from the CDC.
Democrats in Congress have long been critical of RFK Jr.’s leadership at HHS as a vaccine skeptic and conspiracy theorist who has no background in science. Several were quick to call for his resignation amid the leadership exodus from the CDC.
Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who chairs the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee and played a key role in confirming Kennedy despite his own reservations as a physician, said the major departures at the CDC will require congressional oversight.
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