New CDC ‘Management Team’ Named to Replace Koplan, Includes HIV Researcher Julie Gerberding
HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson on Friday announced that an interim "management team" will head the CDC until the Bush administration names a permanent director. Dr. David Fleming, deputy director for science and public health at the CDC, will serve as acting director of the agency, while Drs. James Hughes, director of the National Center for Infectious Diseases at the CDC, and Julie Gerberding, acting deputy director of NCID, will lead the agency's bioterrorism efforts (HHS
release, 3/29). Before joining the CDC in 1998, Gerberding's research at the University of California-San Francisco focused on HIV infection among health care workers. She continued her work on HIV in hospitals while at the CDC and expanded her focus to include other infectious diseases within health care settings (McKenna, Atlanta
Journal-Constitution, 3/30). In addition, Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, will serve as Thompson's representative at the CDC. "This team of skilled professionals will serve the CDC, the department and the nation well until a permanent director is selected," Thompson said (HHS release, 3/29). The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that the "multipart appointment" at the CDC "came as a sharp surprise" to agency employees, who did not expect the Bush administration to name both Fleming and Gerberding to new positions (Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 3/30). The interim management team will replace Dr. Jeffrey Koplan, who announced in February that he would resign as CDC director on March 31. Koplan has accepted a position as vice president for academic health affairs at Emory University in Atlanta (HHS release, 3/29).
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