It is the first time the Senate has been called upon to confirm a C.D.C. director. Dr. Robert F. is close to Dave Weldon: Kennedy Jr., the new health secretary.
Dr. The first time a
director of an agency has been subjected to the confirmation process, Dave
Weldon, a former Republican representative who President Trump chose to lead
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, will appear before the Senate Health
Committee on Thursday. Dr. Among the men
proposed to lead major departments at the Department of Health and Human
Services, 71-year-old Weldon is perhaps the least well-known. However, he is
the one who is most in line with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s new health
secretary.
Dr. Weldon, like Mr. Kennedy, has long questioned the safety of
certain vaccines, and the two have maintained a 25-year relationship. The health secretary has cited Dr. both
Weldon's and his criticisms of the C.D.C. Dr.
From 1995 to 2009, Weldon served in Congress for 14 years. His signature
legislative accomplishment was the Weldon Amendment, which bars health agencies
from discriminating against hospitals or health insurance plans that choose not
to provide or pay for abortions.
He also argued that
abstinence is the most effective way to curb sexually transmitted
infections. Cases have skyrocketed in
recent years, peaking in 2023 before beginning to level out. Dr. Weldon’s hearing takes place amid significant
measles outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico, which have infected more than 250
people and claimed two lives; a flu season that led to record numbers of
hospitalizations; and the potential for a bird flu epidemic.
He is likely to face
tough questions about his views on the measles vaccine, whose safety he has
repeatedly questioned, and on the C.D.C. itself, which he has sharply
criticized for not doing enough to prove that vaccines are safe.
While in Congress,
Dr. Weldon pushed for the vaccine safety
office to be moved out of C.D.C. control, claiming that the agency had a
conflict of interest because it also bought and sold vaccines. In an interview
with The New York Times in late November, Dr.
Weldon claimed to have worked "to get the mercury out of the
childhood vaccines," but he also stated that he was in favor of
vaccination. He stated that both of his adult children are fully immunized. As
a doctor in coastal Florida, he prescribes thousands of doses of flu and other
vaccines to his patients.
“I’ve been described
as anti-vaccine,” Dr. Weldon stated,
"I give shots," however. I support vaccinations." Mr. has also
been questioned by members of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor,
and Pensions. Kennedy — whom they later endorsed — as well as Dr. Dr. Jayanta Bhattacharya Marty Makary, the
respective nominees to lead the National Institutes of Health and the Food and
Drug Administration.
(The hearing for
Dr. Friday will be Mehmet Oz's
nomination to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.) The majority
of the members' remarks have been partisan, except for a few difficult
questions posed by Louisiana Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who chairs the
committee. Dr. It is not anticipated
that Weldon's hearing will be different. Senator Cassidy, who is a physician,
may press Dr. Weldon on the use of the
hepatitis B vaccine, which is administered to children at birth.
Dr. Weldon, like Mr. Kennedy, has questioned the need to immunize
children against hepatitis B, describing it as primarily a sexually transmitted
disease afflicting adults.
