trending Market Intelligence /marketintelligence/en/news-insights/trending/oQNLww_1TqOoYLbJ4htH5g2 content esgSubNav
In This List

CDC director's financial ties impede her ability to lead agency, senator says

Blog

A Pharmaceutical Company Capitalizes on M&A Activity with Brokerage Research

Blog

2021 Year in Review: Highlighting Key Investment Banking Trends

Blog

Insight Weekly: US stock performance; banks' M&A risk; COVID-19 vaccine makers' earnings

Blog

Global M&A By the Numbers: Q3 2021


CDC director's financial ties impede her ability to lead agency, senator says

Financial ties to various industries are impeding the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director from doing her job, a top Democratic senator charged.

CDC Director Brenda Fitzgerald has skipped hearings three times in recent months in which she was called to appear before lawmakers to testify about what her agency was doing to fight opioid addiction in the U.S. due to her ongoing conflicts of interest, said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.

Murray is the ranking member on two Senate panels where Fitzgerald was called to testify but sent a subordinate instead: The Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which held a hearing in October on the opioid crisis, and the Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies, which convened last week on the matter.

Both times, Fitzgerald sent Debra Houry, director of the CDC's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, instead, declaring she had to recuse herself because of matters related to ongoing conflicts of interest outlined in a Sept. 7 signed ethics agreement, which Murray obtained.

The agreement was first made public Dec. 11 by The Washington Post.

The CDC also sent Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director at the agency, to cover for Fitzgerald at an Oct. 25 House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on the opioid epidemic.

Fitzgerald has also recused herself from matters related to cancer because of investments she and her husband hold, which Murray said prevented the CDC director from being involved in "significant issues central to the work" of the agency.

Fitzgerald has attended few public events since being appointed in July by then-Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, who resigned from his job in September after coming under criticism for spending potentially as much as $1 million on private or government jet flights at taxpayers' expense.

"Your continued investments will prevent you from leading on critical issues that fall under" the CDC's mission of fighting diseases at home and abroad and supporting U.S. communities and citizens, Murray told Fitzgerald in a letter.

"I am concerned that you cannot perform the role of CDC director" because of your financial investments related to cancer and opioids — "two of the most pervasive and urgent health challenges we face as a country," Murray wrote.

"In order to ensure that the CDC is led by an individual who can engage on all issues under its purview, it is imperative that you resolve the issues that are currently limiting your ability to divest from these holdings," Murray told Fitzgerald.

"At a time when the need for a comprehensive and ongoing response from the federal government is clear, Congress must be able to hold federal agencies accountable for their role in the response to the opioid crisis, which includes the head of the agency participating in relevant congressional hearings," the Washington Democratic senator said.

According to Fitzgerald's signed ethics agreement, she and her husband hold financial interests in GW Ventures LLC and Greenway Messenger LLC, which she said are limited liability companies formed for the purpose of investing in Greenway Health LLC and Isommune, respectively.

Greenway Health is a health information technology company involved in electronic health records and Isommune is a biotech startup focused on early cancer detection by using custom bioinformatics algorithms to analyze cell RNA sequencing data to identify tumor-specific molecules.

Fitzgerald said her holdings in GW Ventures and Greenway Messenger have transferability restrictions — legal and contractual — that make those interests currently illiquid.

"In the interest of keeping recusal obligations to a minimum, I will continue to be alert to any future opportunities for the interests to be liquidated or transferred; however, for as long as my spouse or I continue to hold these interests, I will not participate personally and substantially in any particular matter that has a direct and predictable effect on the financial interests of GW Ventures or Greenway Messenger, or, by extension, the companies in which they have invested, Isommune and Greenway Health," Fitzgerald wrote.

She also acknowledged that she had reported financial interests in a number of other healthcare and information technology companies, as well as entities in other sectors, like chemical, food, beverage and tobacco products and insurance and energy companies. Fitzgerald said she intended to request a certificate of deposit and would divest in those entities within 90 days of her appointment, regardless of whether she was granted the certificate.

The list of her investments included a number of biopharmaceutical companies, such as AbbVie Inc., Amgen Inc., Baxter International Inc., Johnson & Johnson and Merck & Co. Inc., among others.