WASHINGTON: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Susan Monarez has left the agency less than a month after being sworn in, the Department of Health and Human Services confirmed on Wednesday, and three senior officials have resigned.
CDC Chief Medical Officer Debra Houry and National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases Director Demetre Daskalakis are also out after resigning, Houry told Reuters.
National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases Director Daniel Jernigan has also resigned, days after the agency reported the first U.S. human case of screwworm linked to an ongoing outbreak in Central America.
Reuters has reviewed their resignation letters.
“I am not able to serve in this role any longer because of the ongoing weaponizing of public health,“ Daskalakis wrote in his letter.
The Washington Post first reported Monarez was being ousted earlier on Wednesday, citing multiple Trump administration officials familiar with the matter.
“Susan Monarez is no longer director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We thank her for her dedicated service to the American people,“ a posting on the department’s official X account said.
HHS did not provide a reason for her departure from the agency. The Post, citing several anonymous CDC employees, reported that Monarez on Friday canceled an agency-wide call that had been scheduled for Monday.
“This is a further disaster for the CDC, which will further reduce morale of people at the CDC. These were prominent leaders who were widely respected in the public health community,“ an infectious disease expert with close ties to the CDC said of the Daskalakis and Houry resignations.
“As regards Susan, this sort of extra rapid turnover of leadership also will further reduce morale.”
Monarez, a federal government scientist, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on July 29 to lead the CDC after President Donald Trump nominated her earlier in the year. She was sworn in by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on July 31.
Her departure from the agency follows a shooting at the CDC’s headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, earlier in the month.
Monarez was the Trump administration’s second nominee for the role. In March, the president withdrew his nomination of former Republican congressman and vaccine critic Dave Weldon, a Kennedy ally, just hours before his scheduled confirmation hearing.
Since being named the top U.S. health official, Kennedy has targeted vaccine policy, and in May withdrew a federal recommendation for COVID shots for pregnant women and healthy children.
He followed up in June by firing all members of the CDC’s expert vaccine advisory panel, which recommends how they are used and by whom, and replacing them with hand-picked advisers including fellow anti-vaccine activists.
Kennedy has made major decisions on vaccines in the absence of a CDC director while Monarez awaited confirmation and continued to do so afterwards. Her departure comes on the same day that Kennedy announced changes to COVID vaccine eligibility – REUTERS