Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike expressed her concern today over the announcement the White House would intervene in data transmission from the states to the CDC, holding the new data in a private Health and Human Services server.
“I would be very concerned and fearful to move into a new situation where the CDC does not have that ability to intervene and support the states as it has been.” IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said during a press conference this afternoon. “We also want to make sure that we have data that we can trust and that we can use to make sound decisions going forward and there’s never been a question of that when we share all that information with our public health foundational champion, which is the CDC.”
The private data is not accessible to the public and would be for Trump Administration staff only before circulating down to the nation’s leading health foundation, the Center for Disease and Control.
“They’re a trusted source of information, advice, help, and to go politicize it by interrupting the flow of data, I don’t know what the purpose of interrupting the flow of data to CDC where the data really belongs, and where the experts really are.” Governor Pritzker said during today’s press conference. “It can only be political, and that really concerns me greatly because I’m focused on the health and safety of our people in Illinois. I want to get the best advice that we can get.”
Illinois relies on the real-time data in efforts to combat the virus across the state by working directly with the CDC.
“We send our hospitalizations data directly to, through syndromic directly to the CDC, and just last week I had a call with people who were looking at that data and telling us things, other ways that we can look at the data so we can make sure that we have additional clues to identify outbreaks or anything that may escape detection.” Dr. Ezike told reporters this afternoon. “CDC is our foundational public health entity. Not just in this country, but serves as a leader throughout the world.”
The data had previously been publically available and transparent for researchers and journalists throughout the world, through the CDC’s website.
“CDC is one of those places that you want to rely upon and when you see a President politicizing and interrupting data, intervening, it gives one pause.” Governor Pritzker warned. Illinois once again announced over 1,000 cases of COVID-19 earlier this afternoon during the press conference.
