Susan Monarez, President Donald Trump’s election, to lead the US centers for the control and prevention of diseases, said the Senators on Wednesday that they appreciate vaccines, interventions for public health and strict scientific evidence, but largely the questions of the widespread cuts of the agency and whether they do not with one of the clients of health secretaries agreed not to agree with one of the actions of the health secretary.
“The secretary does the important work of a complex agency,” Monarez told the members of a health committee of the Senate, who will decide whether to drive her nomination forward.
The 50 -year -old Monarez is the first candidate for the CDC director who demands confirmation from the Senate. In January she was appointed as the acting director and in March the candidate for the post office after Trump abruptly withdrawn David Weldon. Monarez is the former director of a state biomedical research agency and a respected scientist, although she has headed the CDC’s first Non -Phector for decades.
Monarez repeatedly said that she was not involved in decisions at the beginning of this year to shorten hundreds of employees and to eliminate CDC programs, but she would work to maintain the core functions and transition critical programs of the agency for other parts of the department for health and human services.
Her answers seemed to frustrate some senators, including the Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine, who said he had no questions about their qualifications.
“I have questions about your willingness to pursue your values,” he said.
In the two -hour hearing, Monarez was asked strongly about Kennedy’s latest change in order to relieve all 17 members of a decisive committee, evaluate and recommend vaccines, and its downplaying the measles risks during a nationwide outbreak and the personnel department of a program, which leads to children.
Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican in Louisiana, who is the chairman of the committee, requested assurances for the scientific integrity of the CDC’s advisory committee for vaccination practices, which Kennedy again included in vaccine skeptics.
“Someone can speak as a critic, but there should be someone who checks the overwhelming evidence of the safety of vaccines,” said Cassidy.
Monarez said that she has emphasized interventions for public health, including vaccinations, and said: “I think vaccines save life.”
“The acip plays a very important role,” she added. “And it has to make sure that it uses science and evidence to promote this decision -making.”
She sworses innovation, “evidence-based fast decision-making” and clear communication about the agency in the amount of $ 9.2 billion, which was commissioned to evaluate vaccines, monitoring illnesses and the observation of the threats to the health of the Americans.
Monarez refused to say whether she had so far not agreed with one of Kennedy’s decisions regarding the agency and said that he had “set a very clear vision”.
“I think he has prioritized important public health activities for the prevention of chronic diseases,” she added.
If Monarez was confirmed, it would end a confusion on the CDC based in Atlanta, where it was not clear for months who was heading the agency. The role of the acting director was partly occupied by Matthew Buzzelli, the head of the CDC chief of staff, the lawyer and political representative without medical experience.
Monarez received his doctorate from the University of Wisconsin in microbiology and immunology, and her post -doctoral student was in microbiology and immunology at Stanford University.
In the CDC headquarters in Atlanta, the employees said that Monarez was rarely heard between the end of January and the end of March when Trump nominated her.
The CDC was founded almost 80 years ago to prevent malaria in the United States from being expanded to be expanded later, and it gradually became a leading global provider of infectious and chronic diseases and a contact point for health information.
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