Rochelle Walensky, the new director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said she will begin her new job with a large to-do list: helping states fix Covid-19 vaccination programs and convincing Americans exhausted from wearing masks and taking other precautions. .
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Walensky said the agency will try to help people overcome doubts about Covid-19 vaccines and vowed to increase public confidence in the CDC.
Dr. Walensky will take over the helm of the CDC on Wednesday as a highly transmissible mutant or variant of the new coronavirus threatens to cause a further rise in infections in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, the vaccination campaign to stop the pandemic is slowly beginning and polls show that many people in the US are hesitant to get vaccinated.
“This is an emergency,” Dr. Walensky said, when she was getting paperwork for her new job so she could work immediately after the change in administrations. New presidents often wait weeks or months to appoint CDC directors.