Oct. 23, 2014 -- President Barack Obama has taken heat for picking former White House aide Ronald Klain -- someone without any medical or public health credentials -- to coordinate the federal government's response to Ebola.
But the new Ebola czar has the enthusiastic support of two leading infectious diseases experts. They say the job requires a proven manager able to coordinate agencies ranging from the CDC to the Department of Homeland Security, and not necessarily someone with health care experience.
"I read all of his qualifications and I thought he was close to ideal," says William Schaffner, MD, chairman of the preventive medicine department at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
"We've got all the medical talent we need across the spectrum," Schaffner says, naming examples such as CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD, MPH, and Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "What Ron Klain brings, I hope, is a vast acquaintance with Washington and how it works.
"He knows how to get things done. He's really the conductor of the Ebola orchestra. The conductor doesn't have to play the violin."
Michael Osterholm, PhD, MPH, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, calls Klain "absolutely the right guy" to be the government's Ebola response coordinator.
Osterholm likens Klain to Leslie Groves Jr., the Army lieutenant general and engineer who directed the Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bomb during World War II.
"Groves knew nothing about nuclear fission," Osterholm says. "But he could cut through red tape. He got things done. That's why the Manhattan Project remains a widely read case study in project management in business schools."
In terms of the nation's Ebola project, "We need to react in virus time, not bureaucratic time," Osterholm says. "Klain will make that happen."
Those kinds of comments run counter to allegations that Obama erred in choosing an unqualified political crony to prevent the spread of the Ebola virus in this country. "This administration is looking at Ebola as a political problem, not a medical or public health problem," says Steven Bucci, PhD, a foreign policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, on the group's web site.
The President's Man
There's no denying that Klain, a lawyer by training, has the words "political operative" written across his resume in large type. Among other positions, he worked on the 1992 and 1996 presidential campaigns of Bill Clinton, served as chief of staff to vice president Al Gore, and assisted Gore in his 2000 election campaign and in the vote recount in Florida. In 2008, he became chief of staff for Vice President Joe Biden and helped implement the massive stimulus program under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009. The Obama administration touts Klain's success in rolling out ARRA as proof of his managerial talent.
source : Klain a Good Pick for Ebola Czar, Experts Say
