Clinton May Have Found an Answer in Dr. Satcher

The Clinton administration has nominated Dr. David Satcher to the long-vacant position of U.S. surgeon general. The White House has had nothing but trouble with this post, but it looks as if this nominee could solve the political problems. If confirmed by the Senate, Satcher will bring to the office a wealth of public health experience likely to encourage fruitful public debate about smoking, AIDS, teenage pregnancy, the link between diet and disease, runaway violence and other factors in the nation’s collective health.

Satcher, 56, could do a lot worse than modeling himself after Dr. C. Everett Koop, the groundbreaking surgeon general who served admirably in the Reagan and Bush administrations. Koop set the standard for putting personality in the position and speaking directly to Americans of the health perils we face. That bully pulpit is now open to Satcher.

A family physician by training, Satcher has since 1993 headed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the federal watchdog for chronic and emerging diseases. Under his leadership the CDC has broadened child immunization and made steps to increase safeguards for the nation’s water and food supplies.

A veteran health administrator, Satcher headed the historically black Meharry Medical College in Nashville for a decade before joining the CDC. He spent the early part of his medical career in Los Angeles, where he served as interim dean at the Charles R. Drew Postgraduate Medical School and chaired its family medicine department.

His varied experiences should serve him well in the surgeon general’s post and, as he assumes additional responsibilities, in the position of assistant secretary of Health and Human Services. The dual roles, last held by a surgeon general in the Carter administration, would broaden his influence.

Satcher has been endorsed by the American Medical Assn. and is expected to clear confirmation hearings with minimal objections since the Senate already confirmed him for the CDC job. The White House floated his name in April without a stir. But he can expect opposition from the National Rifle Assn., which opposes his anti-gun stance, and from critics who complain that a CDC experiment withheld the best available medicine from pregnant women in Africa who were infected with HIV.

Satcher is no Joycelyn Elders, the Clinton administration’s first surgeon general, who knew a great deal more about health care than politics. When Elders left office, Clinton nominated Dr. Henry W. Foster Jr., an obstetrician, but a Republican-controlled Congress balked at confirming him because he had performed legal abortions.

The position has been vacant since the Foster nomination failed in 1995. Now is the time to fill it. The Senate should hold confirmation hearings promptly and put the eminently qualified Dr. David Satcher on the job.