CDC director, under fire for confusing guidance, seeks to reshape messaging

The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention took a calculated gamble Friday as she sought to assume greater control over confused public health messaging about the coronavirus as the pandemic enters its third year.

Rochelle Walensky held her first solo covid-19 news conference since becoming the chief of the public health agency nearly a year ago, vowing that it would be “the first of many.”

The briefing comes at a precarious moment for Walensky, a highly regarded infectious-diseases physician who has come under intense criticism for failing to communicate CDC’s often-changing guidance clearly. With coronavirus cases surging to record levels in the United States and around the world, that criticism has been particularly stinging of late, with an uncharacteristically sharp critique this week from the American Medical Association over the agency’s failure to require a negative coronavirus test result before people exit shortened isolation.

“Potentially hundreds of thousands of people could return to work and school infectious if they follow the CDC’s new guidance on ending isolation after five days without a negative test,” the group said.

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