As flu hits, holes in W.H. health team

The Obama administration declared a “public health emergency” Sunday to confront the swine flu — but is heading into its first medical outbreak without a secretary of Health and Human Services or appointees in any of the department’s 19 key posts.

President Barack Obama has not yet chosen a surgeon general or the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. His choice to run the Food and Drug Administration awaits confirmation.

In an unusual Sunday briefing at the White House, acting CDC Director Richard Besser appeared on camera with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Obama homeland security adviser John Brennan to announce the emergency declaration in response to the swine flu outbreak.

Napolitano is the former Arizona governor, and Brennan is a longtime CIA counterterrorism specialist once thought to be in line to run the agency.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs insisted the vacancies won’t hinder Obama’s response.

“I want to be very clear here: There is a team in place. Part of it is standing behind me, and part of it working as we speak to identify exactly what [Besser] and others have talked about,” Gibbs said. “This notion that somehow that if there is not currently a secretary, that there is not the function that needs to take place to prepare for either this or any other situation is just simply not the case.” “I think it’s all hands on deck, and we’re doing fine,” Gibbs said.

The Senate could vote to confirm HHS Secretary-designate Kathleen Sebelius as early as Tuesday. Obama’s first choice for the post, former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle, withdrew.

As the swine flu outbreak intensified, Obama has received “multiple” briefings a day since Friday on the outbreak, and an interagency response team has been in constant communication, White House aides said.

Health officials have reported 20 cases across five states — Ohio, Texas, New York, California and Kansas — and expect the numbers to rise as doctors perform more tests to detect the illness. None of the U.S. cases have been fatal. The outbreak started in Mexico, where it has killed 80 and infected 1,300.

Obama recently traveled to Mexico, and his host on a museum tour in Mexico City died the next day, showing flu-like symptoms, but Gibbs said, “the president’s health was never in any danger.” He said the flu has a 24- to 48-hour incubation period and that Obama left Mexico nine days ago and has not shown symptoms of the flu nor been seen by a doctor or received preventive

Asked if the president’s decision to golf Sunday at Andrews Air Force Base was part of a White House strategy to reassure people, Gibbs chuckled and replied: “I’m not sure I’d draw a direct conclusion.”

Administration officials said the government declared a “public health emergency” to mobilize resources to combat fears of a global swine flu pandemic. They said the government would release 25 percent of its stockpiles of the flu-fighting drugs Tamiflu and Relenza.

“I wish we could call it a declaration of emergency preparedness,” Napolitano said, insisting that the same measure was taken for the Inauguration and in cases of flood and hurricane. “We’re leaning forward.”

This isn’t the first time Obama has been forced to confront a problem with an agency facing a number of vacancies. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was battling the global financial meltdown earlier this year with 18 vacancies in top positions.

Gibbs said the White House was “hopeful” for a vote soon for Sebelius, but Republicans have held up her nomination over concerns she failed to disclose the full amount of contributions by a doctor who performed late-term abortions.

She would be the first confirmed nominee out of 20 in the department, which is the last in the Cabinet to get a secretary. As of early April, Obama had made only four HHS nominations: Sebelius, Dr. Margaret Hamburg, Bill Corr for deputy secretary and Yvette Roubideaux as director of Indian Health Services, according to the department.

Obama’s team had hoped to bring on CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta as surgeon general, the nation’s top public health spokesman. But Gupta took himself out of the running after Daschle’s departure, and Obama hasn’t picked someone to fill the spot.

Obama named Hamburg, a former New York City health commissioner, to run the FDA, but she hasn’t been confirmed yet.

William Pierce, who worked as spokesman for former HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson in George W. Bush’s administration, said the lack of appointees doesn’t appear to have hampered the response so far.

The CDC has held its own televised press briefings, while Besser came across well at the Sunday White House briefing, Pierce said. The acting surgeon general, Steve Galson, is “very knowledgeable,” he said.

“However, this situation provides the Senate with even more reason to move quickly to confirm Sebelius,” Pierce said. “They also need to move quickly on Margaret Hamburg as the FDA commissioner because, depending on where this outbreak goes, it could mean a new flu vaccine that the FDA would have to approve.”

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