Jim O'Neill

Aug. 29 (UPI) — American nurses are expressing serious concerns over the changes at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the American Nurses Association.

The White House on Thursday named Jim O’Neill, a close ally of top health official Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to serve as acting director of the CDC, according to sources in multiple media reports.

The move came one day after the President Donald Trump administration fired CDC Director Susan Monarez less than one month into the job. Kennedy, secretary of Health and Human Services, had pushed Monarez to resign after she disagreed with his anti-vaccine policies, but she refused.

Four other CDC leaders also resigned Wednesday over frustration about anti-vaccine policy pushed by Kennedy.

“The removal of the CDC director and resignation of key leaders raises serious questions about our country’s ability to respond to a public health crisis if it were to happen today” said ANA President Jennifer Mensik Kennedy in a press release. “There has been a lot of change but not a lot of change management. The amount of change without transparency and clear communication is whipsawing to healthcare professionals and the public at large. Americans deserve steady and consistent leadership at the helm of the CDC to safeguard their health, safety, the economy and national security.”

The press release said that public confidence in federal health guidance hinges on agencies that operate free from political interference and grounded solely in science and evidence-based practice.

“At a time when America faces constant public health threats, these abrupt changes do not further the public’s trust in our health care system and could potentially pose a direct risk to the safety and security of our nation. We are concerned that if a public health crisis were to occur today, our nation would not be positioned to respond effectively,” the release said.

The ANA was removed, along with others, from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which compounds concerns, the ANA said.

“A strong ACIP must be reconstituted to ensure robust and balanced debate. As the largest and most trusted segment of the health care workforce, nurses understand that public health and national security are interconnected as health crises can threaten a nation’s stability, economy and national security. We saw this during COVID. A strong CDC is essential to safeguarding public health,” the release said.

O’Neill, who served as deputy secretary of the HHS, was selected to fill the top CDC post temporarily, unnamed sources told The Washington Post, which first reported the news. Axios and The Hill independently confirmed the appointment.

O’Neill previously served as principal associate deputy secretary of the HHS during the administration of President George W. Bush. He is also the former CEO of the Thiel Foundation, founded by Peter Thiel, a Trump donor.

Monarez has refused to leave her job as head of the CDC and was contesting her ouster, saying only Trump has the authority to fire her. Monarez’s lawyers said Kennedy sought to remove her because she declined “to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives” and she accused him of “weaponizing public health,” according to the BBC.

Aug. 28 (UPI) — The White House chose Jim O’Neill, a close ally of top health official Robert F. Kennedy Jr., on Thursday to serve as acting director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to sources in multiple media reports.

The move comes a day after the Trump administration fired CDC Director Susan Monarez less than one month into the job. Kennedy, secretary of Health and Human Services, had pushed Monarez to resign after she disagreed with his anti-vaccine policies, but she refused.

O’Neill, who served as deputy secretary of the HHS, was selected to fill the top CDC post temporarily, unnamed sources told The Washington Post, which first reported the news. Axios and The Hill independently confirmed the appointment.

O’Neill previously served as principal associate deputy secretary of the HHS during the administration of President George W. Bush. He is also the former CEO of the Thiel Foundation, founded by Peter Thiel, a donor to President Donald Trump.

Monarez has refused to leave her job as head of the CDC and was contesting her ouster, saying only Trump has the authority to fire her. Monarez’s lawyers said Kennedy sought to remove her because she declined “to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives” and she accused him of “weaponizing public health,” according to the BBC.

Four other CDC officials resigned Thursday in protest of Monarez’s firing and in defiance of Kennedy’s anti-vaccine policies.

Aug. 13 (UPI) — The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told employees about the dangers of misinformation, four days after a suspected gunman shot at the agency’s headquarters in Atlanta, claiming the COVID-19 vaccine made him sick.

On Tuesday, Susan Monarez met with staffers virtually and then sent a note to all 10,000 employees nationwide, obtained by ABC News. Staffers at the headquarters have been working remotely since the attack on Friday.

“The dangers of misinformation and its promulgation has now led to deadly consequences,” she wrote. “I will work to restore trust in public health to those who have lost it — through science, evidence and clarity of purpose. I will need your help.”

The comments were slightly different than those during her staff meeting in which she said: “Public health should never be under attack. We know that misinformation can be dangerous.”

She said the health agency can rebuild trust with “rational evidence-based discourse” with “compassion and understanding.”

Dr. Paul Offit, the director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania, told NBC News: “The irony is her boss is the biggest spreader of misinformation.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is secretary of the Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC.

In 2021, during the pandemic, Kennedy described the shot as the “deadliest vaccine ever made” after he filed a citizens’ petition requesting that the Food and Drug Administration end emergency authorization.

Last week, Kennedy announced that HHS was moving to terminate $500 million in contracts to develop vaccines using mRNA technology, which was used to develop the COVID-19 vaccine in 2020.

“After reviewing the science and consulting top experts at NIH [National Institutes of Health] and FDA, HHS has determined that mRNA technology poses more risks than benefits for these respiratory viruses,”

The American Medical Association backs mRNA vaccine research and the CDC still says on its website: “During the COVID-19 pandemic, COVID-19 vaccines underwent the most intensive safety analysis in U.S. history.”

Health officials have denounced skepticism of the research, noting the COVID-19 vaccine saved millions of lives in the United States.

“The Covid pandemic showed us what’s possible when science moves fast,” Rick Bright, who directed the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development from 2016 to 2020, told NBC News. “Dismantling that momentum now is like disbanding the fire department because the fire’s out.”

As head of the HHS, he has updated COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for the fall to be restricted to older adults and those with underlying health conditions. He also doesn’t want children to get the shots.

On Monday, Kennedy toured the CDC campus in Atlanta and met with the widow of the one person slain in the attack, DeKalb County Police Officer David Rose. He toured with Monarez and HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill.

“He offered his deepest condolences and reaffirmed the agency’s commitment to honoring officer Rose’s bravery, sacrifice and service to the nation,” HHS said.

Since the attack, the union representing CDC workers condemned the lack of support from top officials.

“This leadership is critical in reinforcing public trust and ensuring that accurate, science-based information prevails,” the union said Sunday. “This condemnation is necessary to help prevent violence against scientists that may be incited by such disinformation.”

The American Federation of Government Employees Local 2883, which represents more than 2,000 CDC workers, said in a statement Sunday that the attack “was not random and it compounds months of mistreatment, neglect and vilification that CDC staff have endured.”

The union also said: “The deliberate targeting of CDC through this violent act is deeply disturbing, completely unacceptable and an attack on every public servant.”

The father of the suspected gunman, 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White, reportedly told authorities he targeted the CDC over health problems he blamed on the COVID-19 vaccine. He said the shot made him depressed and suicidal.

He was fatally shot by police after around 200 bullets struck the six buildings. Five firearms were recovered.

“All indications are that this was an isolated event involving one individual,” Jeff Williams, the deputy secretary of the CDC’s Office of Safety, Security and Asset Management, said during the staff meeting Tuesday.

Aug. 12 (UPI) — Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has visited the CDC headquarters in Atlanta where a police officer was killed in a shooting that is believed to have targeted the national public health agency.

Kennedy was led by CDC security on a tour of the Roybal Campus on Monday, HHS said in a statement, with HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill and CDC Director Susan Monarez in attendance.

Little information about the tour was made public aside from shattered windows across multiple buildings on campus being pointed out to Kennedy.

Kennedy also visited the DeKalb County Police Department, which lost office David Rose in the shooting. The HHS secretary also visited with Rose’s widow, the statement said.

“He offered his deepest condolences and reaffirmed the agency’s commitment to honoring officer Rose’s bravery, sacrifice and service to the nation,” HHS said.

Rose was fatally shot while responding to the shooting at the CDC headquarters on Friday.

The suspected gunman, 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White, was shot dead by police at the scene.

At least 180 shots were fired during the incident, hitting at least 150 windows and doors at the CDC headquarters, CBS News reported, citing two people with knowledge of the police investigation.

Authorities believe that White targeted the CDC over health problems he blamed on the COVID-19 vaccine.

The shooting came on the heels of Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic, pulling $500 million in funding from developing vaccines using mRNA technology, which was used to develop the COVID-19 vaccine.

Despite support from the medical community for such research and medical therapies, Kennedy claimed “the technology poses more risks than benefits.”

Before his visit, the union representing thousands of workers at the CDC on Sunday called on Kennedy and CDC leadership to make “a clear and unequivocal stance in condemning vaccine disinformation.”

“The deliberate targeting of CDC through this violent act is deeply disturbing, completely unacceptable and an attack on every public servant,” the union said.

“Early reports indicate the gunman was motivated by vaccine disinformation, which continues to pose a dangerous threat to public health and safety.”