The administration of United States President Donald Trump is expected to install Jim O’Neill as acting head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), replacing a director who clashed with the White House over policies that defy scientific evidence.News outlets, including The Washington Post and The Associated Press, reported O’Neill’s selection after Trump officials said they removed CDC Director Susan Monarez.O’Neill is currently deputy to Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).Sources close to Monarez have told news agencies that she butted heads with Kennedy over questions of misinformation and vaccine policy.“She said that there were two things she would never do in the job. One was anything that was deemed illegal, and the second was anything that she felt flew in the face of science, and she said she was asked to do both of those,” Richard Besser, former acting director of the CDC, told reporters.Several high-level CDC officials resigned from their positions in solidarity with Monarez and in defiance of what they depicted as the undermining of scientific expertise as a basis of public health policy. Robert F Kennedy Jr swears in Jim O’Neill as deputy secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services on June 9 [Amy Rossetti/Department of Health and Human Services via AP]Monarez said that she refused to “rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives and fire dedicated health experts”. She had been in her job for less than a month. Advertisement Kennedy, a prominent anti-vaccination activist before joining the Trump administration, has mo …
