The (new) doctor is in: Dr. Mary Bassett’s duty as state health commissioner

Dr. Mary Bassett, an accomplished public health official with a pile of degrees from esteemed institutions, will replace Dr. Howard Zucker, an accomplished public health official with a pile of degrees from esteemed institutions, as New York State’s health commissioner. Zucker’s tenure, especially his hiding of key facts about COVID in nursing homes, proves an impressive pedigree doesn’t guarantee good judgment.

Gov. Hochul, Bassett’s new boss, has said transparency will be a hallmark of her administration. She has yet to honor that promise by opening up files regarding Zucker’s March 25 order directing nursing homes to take back residents still recovering from COVID.

It’s libel to claim that the directive killed 15,000 seniors, but it did have some effect on spread, and Cuomo’s Health Department hid public information. So now it falls to Bassett to disclose the statewide transfer totals and the number of employees sickened daily in each home. She must also release the formal response commissioned by Cuomo and produced by lawyer Elkan Abramowitz.

Clearing a COVID fog is of course not Bassett’s only job. She has to lead the state through the pandemic with smartly structured vaccine mandates; combat chronic diseases and promote wellness; and look for ways to bring down sky-high costs while improving the quality of care.

As a health honcho under two mayors, Bassett has a solid record. Still, last summer, we winced when she joined two other experts to pen an op-ed in these pages saying Black Lives Matter protests were worth the COVID risk “because racism kills.” We don’t dispute that bias fuels some police violence, or that structural inequities contribute to disparate health outcomes. But either mass protests were responsible from a public health perspective or they weren’t; that judgment can’t be viewpoint-based.

Evidence later showed that the rallies didn’t fan COVID’s flames, likely because they were outdoors and enough participants were masked. But there wasn’t sufficient data to know that at the time. Here’s hoping Bassett’s tenure as health commissioner is guided by the best evidence.