The new director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Nov. 30 defended COVID-era policies like vaccine mandates in her first appearance before Congress.
“I’m very proud of the work we did in North Carolina,” Dr. Mandy Cohen, the new director, told Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) after he asked if she regretted any of the policies put into place in North Carolina, such as school closures, when she was the state’s health secretary.
“I feel like we did that in a way that was very inclusive,” she added.
When Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) noted that Dr. Cohen supported harsh measures as health secretary, including vaccine mandates, Dr. Cohen said it was time to “look forward” and start a “new chapter.”
“You have to remember, at different moments in time, we needed different solutions,” she said in response to how Americans would know whether the new director will support the same measures at the federal level.
“The good news is that we’re in a different place than we were before. We both have different tools and have different mechanisms to respond,” she said to another question, about whether she’d shut down schools if a pandemic happened again. “I can’t really address a hypothetical but I think we’ve learned a lot about how to approach things.”
Did closing schools harm students?
“We always knew in-person instruction was incredibly beneficial,” Dr. Cohen said.
Hellbound and Down 