(Washington) The director of the main American health agency left her duties after less than a month in office, the Health Department announced on Wednesday without giving the reasons for this precipitated departure, which occurs by the Trump administration’s vaccinosceptic.
“Susan Monarez is no longer director of centers for the control and prevention of diseases. We thank her for her dedicated service to the American people, ”said the department on X.
According to the Washington Post, which first reported the dismissal of Mme Monarez, the latter refused to undertake to support changes in vaccine policies that the Secretary of Health Robert Kennedy Jr., known for his antivaccin positions, wishes to achieve.
According to officials having expressed anonymity, the director was pushed to resign by the latter.
Solicited by AFP, the department did not immediately respond to this information.
Since entering into office, Robert Kennedy Jr. has started a deep overhaul of American vaccine policy, dismissing renowned experts, restricting access to COVVI-19 vaccines or cutting funds to the development of new vaccines.
Measures often taken against scientific consensus and castigated by external experts.
Susan Monarerez, a career scientist, had been confirmed in late July by the American Senate at the head of the centers for the control and prevention of diseases (CDC), one of the health agencies that the Department of Health oversees.
His appointment was actually a second choice, the White House had to give up in March his first candidate, David Weldon, an ex-elected and doctor known for his vaccinosceptic positions, for fear that he does not miss the voices necessary for the congress.
The hasty departure of mme Monarez occurs in the middle of the CDC crisis, the agency having been the target in early August of an armed attack by a man strongly opposed to the vaccine against the COVVI-19.
Hundreds of employees and former employees of health agencies had signed an open letter in the process denouncing the behavior of the Secretary of Health and accusing him of endangering them by spreading false information, especially on vaccines.
