While the World Health Organization now warns the deadly Ebola outbreak in central Africa “could last months”, Trump’s health secretary who who gutted public health infrastructure and fired 10,000 HHS staff – ousting many career infectious disease scientists while installing science-denying cronies to top posts – says he could not be less “worried about it.”
- SHOT: ABC News: ‘We’re working on it’: HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Ebola, hantavirus response: Kennedy did not respond when asked what his message might be to Americans who are concerned about the diseases potentially spreading in America. He told reporters in the Oval Office last week that the U.S. had the hantavirus outbreak “under control.” … “We have this under control and we’re not worried about it.”
- CHASER: FactPost: The Trump administration has ousted 80% of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ top officials. This comes as Ebola and hantavirus spread internationally.
- LIME: Reuters: Trump administration expects to strip hundreds at US health agencies of job protections: Donald Trump’s administration expects hundreds of health department officials will lose civil service job protections, making them easier to fire, as it carries out a plan to revamp the federal workforce, according to an internal memo reviewed by Reuters.
- WARM BEER: CNN: Penile implant specialist with history of far-right comments led hantavirus presser: Before he joined the Trump administration last year [one of the top public health officials in charge of infectious disease policy], Christine was an Alabama-based urologist who specialized in penile implants. He has little public health experience and a history of far-right commentary and promoting conspiracy theories.
“RFK Jr. is in as much control of this deadly global virus situation as he is of his impulses around dead animals,” said Brad Woodhouse, President of Protect Our Care.
- SEE ALSO: Protect Our Care: Ill-Prepared, Less Safe: Trump Gutted USAID and Exited WHO, Now Administration Behind The Curve On Ebola Global Health Emergency
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