Ex-Baltimore Health Official Leana Wen Sparks Uproar Calling for Bird Flu Vaccine
A former Baltimore health official has sparked backlash after she asked Joe Biden to authorize bird flu vaccines before leaving office. Dr. Leana Wen, the ex-Commissioner for Baltimore’s health department, said on Sunday’s Face The Nation that Biden should do as much as he can to battle the avian influenza outbreak during his last days as president.
Wen, a public health professor at George Washington University, urged the Biden administration to secure FDA authorization for the already-developed vaccine against the bird flu. She said Biden should make the move “because we don’t know what the Trump administration will do about the bird flu.”
Wen expressed concerns that the Trump administration may hold up the vaccine authorization or withhold testing, citing the presence of anti-vaccine stances in the White House. The H5N1 vaccine is already developed and contracted with manufacturers to make almost 5 million doses, but awaits FDA approval.
The bird flu virus has been causing sporadic, mostly mild illnesses in people in the US and nearly all of those infected worked on dairy or poultry farms. A Louisiana resident was hospitalized with a severe case for the first time earlier this month, and California officials have declared a state of emergency over the spread of the virus.
Wen’s comments struck a nerve with many, who recalled her asking Biden to implement vaccine mandates in federal workplaces and public venues during the Covid-19 pandemic. Some critics accused her of being a “politician, not a doctor” and urged people to ignore her health advice.
However, many others have taken to social media to support Wen, saying her comments were reasonable and necessary to combat the bird flu outbreak. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has stressed that the virus poses a low risk to the general public and that there are no reports of person-to-person transmission or signs that the virus has changed to spread more easily among humans.