"New county health officer lacking credentials": New Guest Commentary, July 31, 2024

This is the complete text of my latest opinion piece in the Cumberland (Maryland) Times-News, published July 31, 2024, under the headline "New county health officer lacking credentials."

I am dismayed that Allegany County's newly appointed public health officer has no academic degrees relevant to public health, only an undergraduate degree in accounting with a minor in business.

Let's compare. Maryland has 23 counties plus a de facto No. 24, Baltimore City, which gives it 24 health officers—all of whom are members of the Maryland Association of County Health Officers (MACHO), whose website lists them all by names and credentials. Only Prince George's is unaccountably left off the list; I looked that one up separately.

Of the 24 health officers, all but one (in Kent County) have letters after their name, indicating advanced degrees and certifications, and 10 have multiple such credentials. As a result, the numbers below will total more than 24.

I count 13 M.D. degrees—that is, medical doctors—and six master's degrees in public health (MPH). Indeed, the health officers in Frederick, Prince George's and St. Mary's have both degrees. One of the MPHs listed is Allegany's former health officer, Jenelle Mayer, whose entry presumably will be updated soon.

I count four additional master's degrees—in subjects including business administration, healthcare administration and nursing—plus one Ph.D. and one law degree, a J.D.

The rest of the abbreviations are certifications. Two nurses with master's also are board-certified advanced practice RNs and licensed clinical alcohol and drug counselors.

One health officer, in Carroll, is a licensed environmental health specialist—a certification that our newly named health officer, lacking an undergraduate science degree, is unqualified to seek in Maryland without first getting a graduate degree, according to the state Health Department's online LEHS brochure.

In addition, Baltimore County's M.D./MBA is also a Certified Physician Executive, while Prince George's M.D./MPH is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Our newly named health officer is doubtless a fine person with many skills and valuable institutional memory. But is this person qualified to be, in effect, the surgeon general of Allegany County, speaking scientific truths in a strong voice to elected officials, to the medical community, to the general population?

Keep in mind that our county is already ravaged by drug and alcohol addiction, by the long-term toxins of centuries of extractive industries, by the physical toll of multigenerational, systemic poverty and ignorance.

Too often, the loudest local voices are those of crusaders against vaccination, fluoride, women's health care, and anything else they associate with the "so-called experts" of modern medicine—indeed, of the modern world.

Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of our neighbors died of COVID and its complications, even as many survivors deny that the disease ever existed—and deny, too, the climate change that leaves our area ever more vulnerable to airborne and tick-borne diseases, choking wildfire smoke, life-threatening allergies and other ills.

Many already believe the county leadership, come the next pandemic, will be less interested in maintaining public health than in keeping schools, churches and businesses open no matter the cost. The new appointment does nothing to quell these suspicions.

At the very least, Allegany County needs to shore up confidence quickly by announcing an all-star, blue-ribbon panel of doctors, nurses, scientists and public-health experts to advise our local Health Department, including its new leader, and to speak publicly, truthfully and honestly on all the life-and-death issues facing us, unencumbered by politics.

If medical expertise is no longer a qualification for Health Department leadership, our community prognosis is poor indeed.

Andy Duncan

Frostburg