President Biden to Pick Pro-Lockdown Physician to Lead CDC
President Biden intends to nominate Dr. Mandy Cohen as new director of the CDC. Cohen continuously promoted bad science during the pandemic, but is tasked with preparing us for the next one.
Many rejoiced at the news when Dr. Rochelle Walensky, current director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), tendered her resignation and declared she was stepping down from the agency. The CDC has become infamous for its poor performance during COVID-19 and for overstepping its authority.
As we all know, just a short jaunt ago, the CDC made our lives miserable with their ridiculous COVID-19 recommendations based on fake unsubstantiated science.
Walensky herself falsely claimed COVID vaccines prevented transmission of the virus and that vaccinated people didn’t carry the virus and wouldn’t get sick. These claims were used to back up the overused and sorely taken out of context ideal of “loving your neighbor as yourself”—best demonstrated by subjecting yourself to an experimental medical procedure that does not work and could leave you paralyzed or dead.
Walensky, and the CDC, doctored all sorts of numbers to make the virus look scarier than it was and the vaccine more effective than it was, downplayed breakthrough infections, implemented arbitrary quarantine guidelines, were cheerleaders of lockdowns, and forced everyone to wear face diapers because breathing in your own carbon dioxide seemed like a great idea.
Walensky, in August 2022, finally came to terms with the reality that about zero people trust the CDC, and it needed an overhaul. Probably realizing the task was impossible, Walensky announced her departure soon after. One can expect she will follow in the footsteps of previous CDC directors and go through the magical world of revolving doors to a pharmaceutical company that profited off her bad marketing and ridiculous recommendations. Perhaps Pfizer or even Merck?
Meanwhile, the rest of us waited for President Biden to do something to fix the floundering money-wasting agency, only to be let down once again.
Several days ago, President Biden announced plans to appoint North Carolina’s former health secretary Dr. Mandy Cohen as Walensky’s replacement. Cohen is best known for pushing aggressive COVID-19 restrictions and peddling misinformation about face masks and vaccines. Her first task would be to restore the demoralized CDC to prepare it for future pandemics.
After reports of Cohen’s nomination surfaced, social media posts showed her bragging about imposing COVID-19 lockdowns, inconsistently following her own mitigation recommendations, and forcing public schools to mask their students indoors regardless of vaccination status.
Cohen also promoted information from the CDC that has since been repeatedly debunked, including false claims that COVID vaccines prevented breakthrough cases and virus transmission.
Cohen was “nuts for masks” despite no evidence they achieved anything other than bad breath and acne.
Barbara Rimer, dean of UNC School of public health until 2022, sat in on early pandemic calls with North Carolina Gov. Roy Cohen, legislators, and other academics and commended Cohen’s approach.
Rimer claims Cohen was an outstanding communicator during pandemic press conferences with Cooper.
“Science took the lead,” even “in a highly political environment,” Rimer said. “I think that will stand her in really good stead as she takes over CDC.”
But what good is communicating if you’re communicating misinformation?
Standard School of Medicine Professor Jay Bhattacharya suggested Cohen be asked the following during her confirmation hearing:
“Someone in the confirmation hearing should ask the new @cdcgov director nominee about how she got the science so consequentially wrong. Lots of bad answers possible.
“A good response [would be] ‘I’ll surround myself with scientists with a diverse set of views so it doesn’t happen again.’”
The CDC, White House, and Cohen have not commented on the nomination.
To make matters worse, Biden recently selected Monica Bertagnolli, with deep ties to Big Pharma, to lead the National Institutes of Health.
One thing is abundantly clear, U.S. health officials stepping away from their top agency positions over failed COVID-19 policies and increased scrutiny are merely being replaced with the same . . . individuals who parroted bad pandemic policies, failed to consider any science that conflicted with their narrative and are in the same questionable relationships with pharmaceutical companies.
I think they followed the seance instead of the science.
It's unfortunate but at this point almost inevitable to see this administration dig itself deeper into a pit of fear and restrictions. As far as I'm concerned, it's only making me more determined to do what I can to stop this.