Jung Eun-kyung, the director of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who has been fighting at the forefront throughout the fight against COVID-19, has stepped down from the position of head of quarantine.
Commissioner Jeong is retiring as the new head of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), as President Yoon Seok-yeol appointed Baek Kyung-ran, a professor of medicine at Sungkyunkwan University, who served as a transition committee member for the presidency today (17th).
Since July 2017, Commissioner Jeong has served as the head of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and has served as the 'control commander'.
After facing Corona 19 as the head of the headquarters, in September 2020, after the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was promoted to the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, he became the first director and did not leave the 'front line'.
It is the first time in 4 years and 10 months that Director Chung has stepped down from the position of head of quarantine.
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She has been leading 'K-Quarantine' for 2 years and 4 months since the first case of Corona 19 in Korea in January 2020.
Director Chung said that since 1995, she joined the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (then the National Institutes of Health) and has dedicated herself to the field of disease and quarantine for 28 years.
She said that in 2015, she took the lead in managing the crisis during the MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) outbreak, but she was responsible for the spread of the outbreak at the time and was disciplined.
Director Chung impressed her people with her sincere response and her unselfish devotion, especially in relation to her COVID-19 crisis.
In the early days of the epidemic, when the number of confirmed cases surged in Daegu and Gyeongsangbuk-do, an anecdote of cutting her hair short saying she would save time washing her hair, and details of her use of business promotion expenses that revealed her frugal spending became a hot topic.
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His gray hair, worn out shoes, and Chung's calm and unwavering response were recognized as symbols of overcoming Corona.
At the time of the appointment of Director Chung, the award ceremony was held at the 'on-site', considering the busy situation.
The President personally visited the Center for Emergency Situation at the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and awarded the letter of appointment.
He was also included in Time magazine's '2020 World's 100 Most Influential People'.
Commissioner Jeong has been evaluated as 'meticulous' and 'a person who has nothing but quarantine and national health' among his employees.
In particular, even at the end of her tenure with the inauguration of a new government, she directly participates in most quarantine-related meetings and events, revealing her trademark sincerity until the very end.
Even on the 13th, she attended the meeting of the new government's Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters (major) meeting, and even at the moment when the news of the appointment of the new director was announced, she was still in the plenary meeting of the National Assembly's Health and Welfare Committee to review the new government's coronavirus budget. was attending.
However, as she is a symbolic figure of the Moon Jae-in government's Corona 19 prevention policy, along with the Moon administration's achievements in relation to her quarantine policy, her criticism also fell to the head of Chung.
Commissioner Jeong said at the National Assembly today, "I think (the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) has carried out scientific quarantine for the past two years. It is a policy that involves political judgment,” he said.
(Photo = National Assembly Photo Reporters, Yonhap News)