The day before Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will face a public grilling in front of the Senate Finance Committee, a former high-ranking official who resigned from her position at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention penned an op-ed for The Washington Post suggesting three lines of inquiry lawmakers should follow with Kennedy under threat of congressional contempt.

Writing that, until last week, she served as the CDC’s chief medical officer, Debra Houry explained that she had a “firsthand view of how public health policy has been affected,” and that gives her an advantage on where the testimony should be taken.

According to the doctor, Kennedy needs to be pressed on how Americans will be made healthier as he cuts off funding for programs that have proved effective.

“In the proposed CDC budget, funding is slated for deep cuts, and under the reorganization plan, these lifesaving efforts would shift to a new ‘Administration for a Healthy America,’ where the focus on prevention will be at risk of being diluted or lost,” she pointed out before warning, “Services alone cannot close the health gap; prevention is essential. If the nation is truly going to be healthier, the best path would be to double down on these proven strategies, not dismantle them.”

Secondly, she advised that Kennedy should be pressed on what plans he has in store if the country faces another pandemic like Covid-19, which led to, 1.2 million confirmed deaths in the United States, according to the CDC.

“Data about Covid19 has decreased by over 60 percent — so we might not know if a threatening new variant is emerging,” she claimed. “Polio lab submissions have completely stopped: We will not be able to stop polio at its source before it lands on American soil. We are not ready for emerging health threats, and it’s only getting worse.”

Houry also wants Kennedy to be put on the spot about transparency at a time when the CDC, during his tenure, appears more interested in hiding information than sharing it.

“In the past several months, I have seen how far America is from achieving that standard. I learned about a change to the CDC’s Covid-19 guidance not from scientific briefings or official channels, but from a post on X by the HHS secretary announcing it,” she complained before adding, “The public must know that CDC guidance is grounded in the best available science and communicated openly and honestly, even when the science evolves. That means data must be shared quickly, uncertainty acknowledged directly and political pressure resisted. Without that, trust erodes — and with it, the ability to save lives in moments of crisis.”

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