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 The agency, which has pledged to overhaul its lab safety programs,
said Dr. Robbin Weyant, who formerly led the agency's select agent
program, will now serve as a senior advisor in its newly formed
Office of the Associate Director for Laboratory Science and Safety.
In September, the CDC tapped Dr. Stephen Monroe, a longtime lab
scientist and agency insider, as the CDC's first permanent associate
director of lab safety, a new high-level position reporting directly
to the CDC's Director, Dr. Thomas Frieden.
Creating a new high-level safety position was a key recommendation
of a months-long internal investigation into the mishandling of
anthrax, bird flu and Ebola in CDC labs in 2014, according to an
internal CDC memo obtained by Reuters last December.
Dr. Daniel Sosin is now serving as acting director of the select
agent division, according to a CDC statement. The CDC's Division of
Select Agents and Toxins is charged with developing regulations for
hundreds of labs that work with select agents and with investigating
the mishandling of these substances.
Sosin was deputy director of the Office of Public Health
Preparedness and Response, according to the CDC website.
[to top of second column] |
An agency spokesman would not elaborate beyond the CDC's written
statement or answer any questions about why it made the personnel
changes, which were first reported by USA Today.
(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Julie Steenhuysen; editing by G
Crosse, Mohammad Zargham)
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