Center for American Progress

STATEMENT: Neera Tanden on Ron Klain’s Appointment as Ebola ‘Czar’
Press Statement

STATEMENT: Neera Tanden on Ron Klain’s Appointment as Ebola ‘Czar’

Washington, D.C. — Neera Tanden, Center for American Progress President and former advisor on health reform in the Obama administration, issued the following statement after the White House announced that Ron Klain would manage the government’s response to the Ebola outbreak:

Ron Klain is an excellent choice to manage the U.S. response to the Ebola outbreak. As the chief of staff to two vice presidents, he has proven to be an extremely adept manager with a deep understanding of how to best utilize the federal government’s many resources to control the crisis. At this point, the situation calls for managing multiple agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC; National Institutes of Health, or NIH; the U.S. Department of State; and the military—as well as operations as diverse as patient care and plane travel. Klain is extremely capable of managing such complex challenges. Having a proven manager at the helm will allow health and disease professionals, such as CDC Director Thomas Frieden and Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, or NIAID, to focus on ensuring their agencies are operating at their greatest potential in order to combat the disease.

For more information on this topic, contact Tom Caiazza at 202.481.7141 or [email protected].

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