Rochelle Walensky, who has been named director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, speaks after U.S. President-elect Joe Biden announced his team handling the Covid-19 pandemic at The Queen in Wilmington, Delaware. on December 8th. , 2020.
Jim Watson | AFP | Getty Images
On Wednesday, scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who were ousted by the Trump administration during the Covid-19 pandemic “will be heard again,” said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the election of President-elect Joe Biden to lead the agency.
Last year, the CDC spent months without addressing the U.S. public after Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Vaccination and Respiratory Disease, warned in February that schools and businesses could have to close to contain the coronavirus.
“We are asking the American public to work with us to prepare for the expectation that this could be bad,” Messonnier said in mandatory comments that brought markets down and reportedly irritated the president. Donald Trump.
Throughout the pandemic, Trump has continued to clash with the nation’s top scientists, including current CDC director Dr. Robert Redfield, publicly contradicting it on issues such as the chronology of the Covid-19 vaccine.
Walensky promised to restore the public voice of the CDC and its scientists.
“They have shrunk. I think they have been baffled. This science has not been heard,” Dr. Howard Bauchner told the American Medical Association Journal on Tuesday. “This world-renowned top agency has not really appreciated itself in the last four years and has been very remarkable over the last year, so I have to fix that.”
Walensky said he intends to renew CDC’s communications efforts under the Biden administration. This could include regular briefings led by Walensky or subject matter experts to explain the scientific research published in the CDC’s weekly morbidity and mortality report, he said. He added that it would probably also mean a more concerted plan to engage the public on social media.
“Now science is transmitted via Twitter. Science is transmitted on social media, podcasts and in many different ways, and I think it’s fundamental,” Walensky said. “We need to have a social media plan for the agency.”
He said strengthening the agency’s presence on social media will be especially important as the country fights the hesitation. Misinformation about Covid-19 vaccines is common on social media, he said, adding that the agency must pull out “the right information.”
Over the past year, CDC communications have often been at odds with those of the White House. The agency revised guidelines on the reopening of churches and religious sites after Trump urged state officials to allow the reopening of houses of worship. And over the summer, Trump installed longtime ally and former campaign officer Michael Caputo as chief spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services, the CDC’s main department, in an effort to better align messaging with White House.
Caputo and his team tried to undermine CDC scientists, pressuring them to review scientific research that included White House-driven guidelines, show internal emails obtained by House lawmakers. Walensky said Tuesday he will make sure the CDC communicates transparently with the American people regardless of the political consequences.
“I have to fix this right away,” he said.