New CDC chief seeks to foster trust in the battered agency
Dr. Mandy K. Cohen dropped by the Fox affiliate in Dallas in November, just days after the governor of Texas signed a law barring private employers from requiring COVID-19 shots. If she thought promoting vaccination would be a tough sell in a rubyred state, Cohen, the new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, did not give any indication.
“I'm not just the CDC director, I'm also a mom,” she said cheerily, noting on live television that her daughters, 9 and 11, had already received the latest COVID and flu shots. She added, “So I wouldn't recommend something for the American people I wouldn't recommend for my own family.”
It was the kind of stock phrase that Cohen has repeatedly invoked as she pursues a task that some public health experts fear is impossible: restoring Americans' faith in public health, and in her battered agency. Five months into her tenure, with the COVID public health emergency officially over, the CDC's new leader is relentlessly on message.
Americans' trust in the agency, and in science more broadly, was badly damaged by the coronavirus pandemic, and the loss of faith is particularly pronounced among Republicans. In a recent survey by the Pew Research Center, 38% of Republicans said they had little or no confidence in scientists to act in the public's best interests, up from 14% in April 2020.
At the same time, the CDC's winter vaccination campaign appears to be falling on deaf ears. On Thursday, the agency issued an alert warning that low vaccination rates for the flu, COVID and respiratory syncytial virus, known as RSV, could lead to “severe disease and increased health care capacity strain in the coming weeks.” And partisan divisions over vaccination persist: A KFF poll in September found that 7 in 10 Democrats but just a quarter of Republicans planned to get the updated COVID shot.
Cohen, whom President Joe Biden selected to succeed Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky, is responding with a nationwide media blitz. Since taking the helm of the CDC in July, she has traveled the country, promoting vaccination in 19 cities in 13 states.
She has left a trail of social media posts in her wake, including a series of short videos, called “CheckIn With Dr. Cohen,” that typically begin with some variation of the same greeting: “Hi everyone, it's Mandy Cohen!”
In one video recorded on Long Island, New York, Cohen and a county health official, wearing hard hats and vests, reported on how wastewater can help scientists track viruses and disease. In Dallas, she appeared with another county health official to talk about the importance of data, and with a nurse at a church health fair. And in Chicago, she stood by the president of the American Medical Association.
When she speaks to reporters, she frequently brings up her children.
“Science is important and yes, the data is important,” Cohen said in an interview with The New York Times. “But at the end of the day, we're also all humans. And if we can have a human-to-human conversation about what I would do for my own kids, who I love and I want to be healthy, maybe that can connect us in a different way.”
Cohen is taking over an agency that is in transition. Her predecessor, Walensky, who began serving at the start of the Biden administration and stepped down in June, commissioned a review of the CDC that identified serious weaknesses in areas ranging from testing to data collection to communications. Walensky then initiated an overhaul of the agency.
Cohen has said she is committed to carrying out that plan, which included setting up a new forecasting and analytics center, as well as structural changes intended to enable the agency to quickly translate its science into coherent policy recommendations. But even her staunchest allies say her top priority must be to change the way the public views her agency.