Levine to tell Congress she’s ‘ready for the job’
WASHINGTON — Former Pennsylvania Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine plans to tell lawmakers Thursday that her long and varied career in Pennsylvania — as a pediatrician, professor, public health advocate and, most recently, the state’s chief communicator during the COVID-19 pandemic — qualifies her to run key federal health programs as assistant secretary of health.
“At its core, my career has been about helping people live healthy lives,” Dr. Levine wrote in her opening statement, as prepared for delivery. “I am both humbled by the opportunity, and ready for the job.”
Of all her roles, Dr. Levine, tapped by President Joe Biden last month for the role in the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services, will likely face questions about her decisions guiding the Keystone State through an unprecedented publ i c h e a l t h
crisis.
Republicans have renewed scrutiny into nursing home deaths after the state’s decision to allow people who had been hospitalized with COVID-19 to return to or enter long-term care facilities. The administration of Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, also has endured GOP anger at statewide shutdown orders and a
slower- than- expected COVID-19 vaccine rollout that lags behind other states.
Democrats on the committee, including Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., are likely to praise her as an effective leader whose tough decisions in the public spotlight make her an ideal candidate.
“She is exactly the kind of crisis-tested leader our nation needs,” Mr. Casey said in a statement coinciding with her nomination on Jan. 19.
If confirmed, Dr. Levine, 63, would be the first openly transgender official to be confirmed by the Senate. And she would assume her biggest job yet after five years working on intractable health problems from Harrisburg, navigating medical science, policy and politics.
A graduate of Harvard and the Tulane University School of Medicine, she trained at the Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York City before moving to Pennsylvania to work at the Penn State College of Medicine and the Penn State Hershey Medical Center.
At Penn State, she started a Division of Adolescent Medicine for teens with medical and psychological problems. At Penn State Hershey, she started the Eating Disorders Program, which offers treatment options for people of all ages. She rose to professor of pediatrics and psychiatry, vice chair of pediatrics for clinical affairs, and chief of the Division of Adolescent Medicine and Eating Disorders.
In 2015, she was selected by Mr. Wolf to be the state’s physician gene r a l a n d w a s u n a n i - mously confirmed by the Republican- controlled Pennsylvania Senate.
In that role, she confronted the worsening opioid epidemic by signing a statewide standing order for the distribution of the naloxone, which can reverse a narcotic overdose. The order enabled emergency medical personnel to carry the medicine and allowed the public to readily access the medication.
In July 2017, Mr. Wolf picked her for state health secretary — and she was unanimously confirmed by the GOP-led chamber once again. Already hailed as a LGBTQ role model, Dr. Levine became one of the highestranking transgender people serving in elected or appointed positions nationwide.
In her prepared testimony, she wrote she has been “particularly invested in health issues that are at the intersection of physical and behavioral health, and I brought that expertise to public health in addressing substance use disorders.”
Dr. Levine will appear before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which, like the full Senate chamber, is controlled by Democrats but its membership is split evenly between the two parties.
Its Democratic chair is Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, and the top Republican is Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina. The committee includes both political moderates like Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, and those more on the fringe, like Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
Republicans may grill Dr. Levine following a political firestorm in New York after the state attorney general revealed COVID-19 deaths in longterm care facilities were underreported by about 50%.
Following that report, a group of U.S. House Republicans from Pennsylvania penned a letter to Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro asking him to investigate the state’s policies and death reporting. In Pennsylvania, more than half of all COVID-19 deaths in Pennsylvania occurred in nursing homes, including one of the worst outbreaks in the nation in Beaver County at Brighton Rehabilitation and Wellness Center.
On Wednesday, Mr. Shapiro responded that such inquiries are the state inspector general’s jurisdiction — and he pointed out the GOP lawmakers voted against millions in federal COVID-19 aid to nursing homes.
Dr. Levine also could take some heat from critics for Pennsylvania’s lagging performance rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine. The state has fallen behind most other states in administering the vaccine, though it has quickened the pace of vaccinations this month, according to data posted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As of Tuesday morning, Pennsylvania has administered almost 2.4 million doses, or nearly 73%, of the 3.2 million doses delivered by the federal government. That’s up from the 57% administration rate from the start of the month.
If confirmed, Dr. Levine would have wide influence.
The assistant secretary of health oversees the Office of the Surgeon General, the Public Health Service, and other key offices tasked with vaccine policy, adolescent health, women’s health, minority health and disease prevention. The assistant secretary hears from 13 advisory committees ranging from health equity to tickborne diseases to fitness and nutrition.
Dr. Levine’s nomination garnered letters of support from at least 45 health organizations, advocacy groups, universities and hospitals.
The American Academy of Pediatrics praised Dr. Levine’s attention to health issues affecting children and adolescents, including immunizations, disaster preparedness, lead exposure, maternal and infant mortality, and substance use.