The Club PUBlication 12/01/2025

CDC’s new No. 2 leader was vaccine skeptic in Louisiana
Ralph Abraham halted promoting vaccinations such as flu shots.
By LENA H. SUN The Washington Post

Dr. Ralph Abraham

A Louisiana health official who ordered his health department to stop promoting mass vaccinations this past winter during a surge in influenza cases has been tapped to serve as the new No. 2 leader at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Ralph Abraham, who is Louisiana's surgeon general, has been hired to be the principal deputy director at the CDC, according to a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, who confirmed the appointment. It is not clear when Abraham begins in the position. He is listed in the CDC's internal directory as principal deputy director; a CDC email listed for him does not work.

The nation's top public health agency currently has no permanent director, and Abraham would essentially be running the agency. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ousted CDC Director Susan Monarez this summer after she resisted his requests to agree to vaccine recommendations he wanted an influential CDC advisory committee to make. HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O'Neill is serving as acting CDC director.

Abraham adds to the vaccine critics working at the CDC under Kennedy, a prominent antivaccine activist before becoming the country's top health official. Kennedy fired all of the CDC's federal vaccine advisers and replaced them with people who have criticized coronavirus and other shots.

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry, who took office in 2024, appointed Abraham as his top health official as a medical freedom movement grew in the state to oppose vaccine mandates.

Abraham drew intense criticism in office for instructing health officials to stop promoting vaccines including flu shots and instead emphasize personal choice and consulting with doctors. In a December legislative hearing, Abraham said he regularly sees patients injured by coronavirus vaccines and alleged adverse reactions were being covered up, NPR reported. He has also supported research into an extensively debunked connection between vaccines and autism.

In a February letter explaining his perspective on vaccines, Abraham argued that government agencies should avoid promoting "pharmaceutical products" when the manufacturers are protected against lawsuits for harm.

"It is understood that the products pushed will benefit some and cause harm to others, but public health pushes them anyway with a one-size-fits-all, collectivist mentality whose main objective is maximal compliance," Abraham wrote.

He accused the CDC and other public health agencies of overreaching in response to the COVID pandemic and damaging public trust.
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"Vaccination against any disease should remain a personal choice ," he said.