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PROTECTING PUBLIC AND ANIMAL HEALTH: 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND THE FEDERAL 

VETERINARIAN WORKFORCE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, 

THE FEDERAL WORKFORCE, AND THE 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

FEBRUARY 26, 2009 

Available via http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

and Governmental Affairs 

( 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut, Chairman 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK L. PRYOR, Arkansas 

MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana 

CLAIRE MCCASKILL, Missouri 

JON TESTER, Montana 

RONALD W. BURRIS, Illinois 

MICHAEL F. BENNET, Colorado 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

JOHN MCCAIN, Arizona 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada 

LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina 

MICHAEL L. ALEXANDER, Staff Director 

BRANDON L. MILHORN, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

TRINA DRIESSNACK TYRER, Chief Clerk 

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, THE FEDERAL 

WORKFORCE, AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii, Chairman 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana 

ROLAND W. BURRIS, Illinois 

MICHAEL F. BENNET, Colorado 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina 

LISA M. POWELL, Chief Counsel and Acting Staff Director 

JOEL C. SPANGENBERG, Professional Staff Member 

JENNIFER A. HEMINGWAY, Minority Staff Director 

THOMAS A. BISHOP, Minority Professional Staff Member 

BENJAMIN B. RHODESIDE, Chief Clerk 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Opening statements: Page 

Senator Akaka .................................................................................................. 1 

Senator Voinovich ............................................................................................. 3 

WITNESSES 

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2009 

Lisa R. Shames, Director, Natural Resources and Environment, U.S. Government Accountability Office .................................................................................. 4 

Nancy H. Kichak, Associate Director for Strategic Human Resources Policy, 

U.S. Office of Personnel Management ................................................................ 5 

Gerald W. Parker, DVM, Ph.D., MS, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, 

Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services .......................................................... 6 

Jill M. Crumpacker, Director, Office of Human Capital Management, U.S. 

Department of Agriculture .................................................................................. 8 

Thomas J. McGinn, III, DVM, Chief Veterinarian and Director, Food, Agriculture, and Veterinary Defense Division, Office of Health Affairs and Office of the Chief Medical Officer, U.S. Department of Homeland Security ..... 9 

W. Ron DeHaven, DVM, MBA, Chief Executive Officer, American Veterinary 

Medical Association .............................................................................................. 19 

Michael Gilsdorf, DVM, Executive Vice President, National Association of 

Federal Veterinarians .......................................................................................... 20 

Marguerite Pappaioanou, DVM, MPVM, Ph.D., Dip ACVPM, Executive Director, Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges ............................... 21 

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Crumpacker, Jill M.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 8 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 59 

DeHaven, W. Ron, DVM, MBA: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 19 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 80 

Gilsdorf, Michael, DVM: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 20 

Prepared statement with an attachment ....................................................... 88 

Kichak, Nancy H.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 5 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 39 

McGinn, Thomas J., III, DVM: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 9 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 64 

Pappaioanou, Marguerite, DVM, MPVM, Ph.D., Dip ACVPM: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 21 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 99 

Parker, Gerald W., DVM, Ph.D., MS: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 6 

Prepared statement with an attachment ....................................................... 42 

Shames, Lisa R.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 4 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 29 

Page

IV 

APPENDIX 

Questions and Responses for the Record from: 

Ms. Shames ....................................................................................................... 113 

Ms. Kichak ........................................................................................................ 115 

Dr. Parker ......................................................................................................... 122 

Ms. Crumpacker ............................................................................................... 126 

Dr. McGinn ....................................................................................................... 135 

Dr. Gilsdorf ....................................................................................................... 138 

Dr. Pappaioanou ............................................................................................... 142 

Background .............................................................................................................. 160 

GAO report entitled ‘‘Veterinarian Workforce, Actions Are Needed to Ensure 

Sufficient Capacity for Protecting Public and Animal Health,’’ GAO–09– 

178, February 2009 .............................................................................................. 165 

(1) 

PROTECTING PUBLIC AND ANIMAL HEALTH: 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND THE FEDERAL 

VETERINARIAN WORKFORCE 

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2009 

U.S. SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT

MANAGEMENT, THE FEDERAL WORKFORCE,

AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:50 p.m., in room 

SD–342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Daniel K. Akaka, 

Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Akaka and Voinovich. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA 

Senator AKAKA. I call this hearing of the Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce, and the 

District of Columbia to order. 

I want to, with much aloha, welcome our witnesses to this hearing and I want to thank you very much for being here. The topic 

of today’s hearing is an area that we want to work on and try to 

deal with, and we have invited you because we feel you can help 

us do that. 

Today’s hearing, ‘‘Protecting Public and Animal Health: Homeland Security and the Federal Veterinarian Workforce,’’ will examine the results of a Government Accountability Office (GAO) review 

of the Federal veterinarian workforce. The Federal veterinarian 

workforce is on the front lines in ensuring our homeland security, 

public health, and food safety. In total, there are over 3,000 veterinarians working in the Federal Government. Their role is especially critical in areas of disease prevention and response. 

Although we are not facing a major disease outbreak in the 

United States right now, we must remain vigilant, and this is what 

this hearing is about. About 75 percent of newly emerging infectious diseases originate in animals. One example of this type of 

zoonotic disease is avian influenza. According to the World Health 

Organization, the H5N1 strain of avian influenza has led to over 

250 human fatalities in about 400 known cases, over a 60 percent 

fatality rate. This outbreak has occurred overseas, but we should 

remember that diseases do not respect international borders and 

may prove difficult to control. 

2 

Our livestock and food supply also could be endangered by animal diseases. The 2001 foot and mouth disease outbreak in the 

United Kingdom led to the slaughter of more than four million animals and cost the British agriculture and food sectors over $5 billion. Some experts believe that a similar foot and mouth disease 

outbreak in the United States could reduce our agricultural income 

by over $14 billion. 

I requested that GAO undertake a comprehensive review of the 

Federal veterinarian workforce because I was concerned that our 

Nation’s homeland security, public health, and food supply and 

safety may be harmed by the growing shortage of veterinarians. 

Unfortunately, GAO’s report suggests that these concerns are well 

founded. This hearing today provides us an opportunity to assess 

the state of this crucial workforce and ways to improve it. 

I would like to highlight a number of the issues that concern me 

in particular, which I hope our witnesses will address. GAO has 

listed strategic human capital management on its High-Risk Series 

since 2001. It is unclear why agencies, departments, and the Office 

of Personnel Management have not taken more steps to address 

the causes of human capital challenges in such a critical part of the 

Federal workforce. Direct hire authority is not enough. Strategic 

workforce planning through a collaborative, ongoing process to anticipate and resolve critical workforce challenges among Federal 

agencies, with the support of the Office of Personnel Management, 

would be a better approach. 

There is a pressing need to address Federal veterinarian workforce shortages. The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) has 

a 15 percent veterinarian work shortfall. Some veterinarians in 

this agency are assigned to multiple slaughter plants and have 

voiced their concerns that they cannot always meet their responsibilities, such as sanitation and food safety checks, and perform 

high-quality work. Although FSIS is using recruitment bonuses 

and internships to attempt to lower its vacancy rates, this is not 

a comprehensive approach to the problem. Due to unpleasant work 

conditions at slaughterhouses and their remote locations, along 

with limited professional development opportunities and lower pay, 

FSIS has difficulty attracting and retaining veterinarians. 

A lack of comprehensive human capital planning also leads to 

competition for veterinarians between agencies, even within the 

same department. For instance, according to GAO, many FSIS inspectors move to the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service 

(APHIS) within the U.S. Department of Agriculture for greater pay 

and more appealing work. According to APHIS, 17 percent of their 

veterinarian hires over a recent 4-year period were from FSIS. 

A wave of Federal veterinarian retirements may worsen these 

workforce challenges. More than one-fourth of the veterinarians at 

key agencies for public health and food safety will be eligible to retire within 3 years. 

In sum, a shortage of Federal veterinarians and lack of comprehensive planning to address the shortage require immediate, 

sustained, and focused attention. I look forward to hearing more 

about the issues affecting the Federal veterinarian workforce. We 

should not wait for another homeland security, public health, or 

food safety crisis to begin to address this problem. 

3 

So at this point, let me call on the Subcommittee’s Ranking 

Member, Senator Voinovich, a good friend and a leader in human 

capital. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR VOINOVICH 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When I first 

heard about having this hearing, I thought, what are we spending 

our time on this issue for, until I got into it. We probably should 

have had this hearing 8 years ago. Senator Akaka and I have been 

working on the human capital crisis for a long time and we are 

proud of the changes that we made in Title V of the Federal Code, 

but as I read the background on this, it is just incredible to me 

where we are today. 

My brain says, where was somebody that looked back and looked 

this whole thing over and said, we have got a problem here? First 

of all, we are not producing enough of these people. Second of all, 

when you look at the pay schedule within the Federal Government 

compared to the private sector, it is not adequate to get the job 

done. You think to yourself, why didn’t somebody bring this up to 

the Office of Management and Budget and say, look, we just can’t 

keep going this way. So we just have hobbled along. Some of you 

have been here in your departments for a while. I would like to 

know why this wasn’t brought to the top, or was it brought to the 

top and nobody paid attention and didn’t care about it? 

But my logic tells me that, first, we are not producing enough 

veterinarians in the country, period. Second, I know from my experience as Governor of Ohio, it is harder to get into veterinarian 

school than it is into medical school, so maybe we ought to get 

some of these folks that are thinking about becoming doctors going 

into veterinarian school. 

And maybe we need to do what we did, Senator Akaka, I think 

indirectly you were involved in this, and that is with the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission, where we recognized 7 years ago that they 

were closing down nuclear engineering schools around the country 

and we went up to MIT and we went to—I am from the University 

of Cincinnati—and said to them, hey, there is going to be a great 

need for these people. And today, and I am very proud of this, the 

NRC has been able to replace the people that have been retired 

and they have also been able to bring on more people so they can 

handle relicensing and also these new applications that are coming 

in for new nuclear facilities. 

So the real issue here is trying to figure out where we go from 

here, and that is the end of my statement. I will put the rest of 

it in the record. We are going to have another vote at 3:45, so I 

am anxious to hear your testimony and maybe have a chance to 

ask some questions. Thank you. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Senator Voinovich, for 

your leadership. 

Let me welcome our first panel of witnesses to the Subcommittee 

today: Lisa Shames, Director of Natural Resources and Environment, U.S. Government Accountability Office; Nancy Kichak, Associate Director for Strategic Human Resources Policy, U.S. Office of 

Personnel Management; Dr. Gerald Parker, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of the Assistant Secretary for PreparedVerDate Nov 24 2008 12:01 Jan 14, 2010 Jkt 049491 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\49491.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
4 

1The prepared statement of Ms. Shames appears in the Appendix on page 29. 

ness and Response, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Jill Crumpacker, Director, Office of Human Capital Management, U.S. Department of Agriculture; and Dr. Thomas McGinn, 

Chief Veterinarian and Director, Food, Agriculture, and Veterinary 

Defense Division, Office of Health Affairs and Office of the Chief 

Medical Officer, U.S. Department of Homeland Security. 

As you know, it is the custom of the Subcommittee to swear in 

all witnesses and I would ask all of you to please stand and raise 

your right hand. 

Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give 

the Subcommittee is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 

the truth, so help you, God? 

Ms. SHAMES. I do. 

Ms. KICHAK. I do. 

Dr. PARKER. I do. 

Ms. CRUMPACKER. I do. 

Dr. MCGINN. I do. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. Let the record show that our witnesses responded in the affirmative. 

Before we start, I want you to know that your full written statement will be made a part of the record. I would also like to remind 

you to keep your remarks brief, given the number of people testifying this afternoon. 

Ms. Shames, will you please proceed with your statement. 

TESTIMONY OF LISA R. SHAMES,1 DIRECTOR, NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT, U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Ms. SHAMES. Thank you. Chairman Akaka, Senator Voinovich, 

and Members of the Subcommittee, I am pleased to be here today 

to discuss our findings on the Federal Government’s veterinarian 

workforce. As you know, there is a growing shortage of veterinarians nationwide, yet GAO’s overall conclusion is that the Federal 

Government has not yet assessed whether its veterinarian workforce is sufficient to protect public and animal health. 

First, at the department level, USDA and HHS, which employ 

about two-thirds of the government’s veterinarians, appear to be 

unaware of the challenges their component agencies face. For example, as you mentioned, Chairman Akaka, USDA’s Food Safety 

and Inspection Service (FSIS), has not been fully staffed for over 

a decade. This shortage is troubling because its veterinarians who 

work in the slaughterhouses told us that their ability to meet food 

safety responsibilities is impaired. Still, USDA reported that its 

agencies had met or surpassed certain veterinarian workforce goals 

and made no mention of the FSIS shortages. 

Further, USDA’s agencies compete against one another for veterinarians. FSIS loses veterinarians to other parts of USDA, where 

the work is more appealing, opportunities for advancement are 

greater, and the salaries are higher. In fact, the average annual 

salary at FSIS was the lowest among USDA’s agencies that employ 

veterinarians. 

5 

1The prepared statement of Ms. Kichak appears in the Appendix on page 39. 

Similarly, HHS was unaware that a FDA advisory committee reported that the Center for Veterinary Medicine was ‘‘in a state of 

crisis.’’ The Center is responsible for ensuring the safety of veterinarian drugs and regulating animal feed. 

Next, government-wide, at the time of our review, OPM had not 

conducted an effort to address current and future veterinarian 

challenges. We are pleased to note that early in February, OPM approved government-wide direct hire authority for agency use. This 

is a positive first step. Agencies’ concerns about their workforce are 

likely to worsen, though, as large numbers of veterinarians become 

eligible to retire in the near future. For example, USDA’s Animal 

and Plant Health Inspection Service reports that 30 percent of its 

veterinarians will be eligible to retire by the end of 2011. In fact, 

government-wide, 27 percent will be eligible to retire within 3 

years. 

As the shortage grows, agencies that pay veterinarians higher 

salaries have a recruitment advantage. Average salaries vary widely across the government, from $70,000 for the Department of Interior to $122,000 at the Department of Homeland Security. 

In conclusion, until USDA and HHS conduct department-wide 

assessments, they will not fully understand the size and nature of 

their challenges to recruit and retain veterinarians. This will lead 

their component agencies without a high-level solution to problems 

they have been unable to solve on their own. Moreover, OPM will 

not have the necessary information to assess current and future 

needs. In the end, the government risks missing opportunities to 

find common solutions to attract veterinarians into Federal service. 

This concludes my prepared statement and I would be pleased to 

answer any questions that you have. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much for your statement. Now 

I will call on Ms. Kichak for her statement. 

TESTIMONY OF NANCY H. KICHAK,1 ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR 

FOR STRATEGIC HUMAN RESOURCES POLICY, U.S. OFFICE 

OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT 

Ms. KICHAK. Chairman Akaka, Senator Voinovich, I appreciate 

your invitation to speak with you today about the Federal Government’s veterinarian workforce and what the Office of Personnel 

Management is doing to alleviate shortages within this critical occupation. 

Veterinarians are a vital part of the Federal workforce and are 

critically important to ensuring the safety of our Nation’s food supply and protecting public health. So the fact that we are experiencing a shortage in some agencies is of real concern to us. 

I assure you, we have been working on this problem for some 

time. OPM published the regulations implementing direct hire authority on June 13, 2003, and in less than 3 months, a direct hire 

authority was issued to the Department of Agriculture to fill veterinarian medical officer positions. Since that time, we have remained 

strongly committed to providing the tools necessary to assist the 

government in filling these critical positions. 

6 

1The prepared statement of Dr. Parker with an attachment appears in the Appendix on page 

42. 

You have asked how OPM assures that plans are in place to 

identify the workforce needs such as those that arise for veterinarians. A critical source for early identification of concerns in human 

capital management is the Chief Human Capital Officers Council 

and its subcommittees. This organization has been key to bringing 

together the government officials charged with the strategic management of human capital. Another source of data is the human 

capital metrics gathered under our program of oversight and assistance, where we require agencies to undertake strategic workforce 

planning and identify mission critical occupations. 

We recognize that solving a problem like the veterinarian shortage is necessarily a shared responsibility because those who work 

at the sites where services are delivered are most often in the best 

position to identify effective remedies. In this spirit, we have 

worked extensively with the Department of Agriculture to understand their needs concerning the veterinarian workforce. Our efforts included convening focus groups of veterinarians, and our 

staff visited slaughterhouses where they worked in collaboration 

with Agriculture veterinarians to help us update our qualifications 

and classification standards. As a result, the starting grade for veterinarians has increased from GS–9 to GS–11, which is a 20 percent increase in starting pay for veterinarians, and that happened 

beginning in 2007. 

On February 12, 2009, we issued the government-wide direct 

hire authority for veterinarians that will allow agencies to appoint 

veterinarians without following competitive procedures as long as 

they give public notice, and we are not done. We are convening a 

forum in March where we are going to bring together all the agencies that have veterinarians to discuss some of the shared concerns. 

We are highlighting veterinarians at the FSIS on our website, 

USAJOBS. I can share that with you. It looks really good. If you 

go to our USAJOBS website, this is one of the first jobs that comes 

up, and usually that is very effective in gathering applications for 

us. So we are going to continue to work at this problem and I will 

be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Ms. Kichak. Now we will 

hear from Dr. Parker. 

TESTIMONY OF GERALD W. PARKER, DVM, PH.D., MS,1 PRINCIPAL DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY, OFFICE OF THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR PREPAREDNESS AND RESPONSE, 

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 

Dr. PARKER. Good afternoon, Chairman Akaka and Senator 

Voinovich. In the time allowed for my oral presentation, I will 

briefly highlight some of the myriad ways in which veterinarians 

contribute to the mission critical functions of HHS, specifically at 

the FDA, NIH, CDC, and my office, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR). 

The Food and Drug Administration employs veterinarians 

throughout their Centers to ensure the safety of drugs, biologics devices, and foods. When issues regarding a zoonotic disease arise, 

7 

FDA taps its veterinary resources as needed to address the incident or issue. As a primary role of FDA veterinarians in responding to zoonotic disease outbreak is to provide technical scientific 

advice and to help coordinate FDA’s activities with those Federal, 

State, and local agencies, FDA believes this flexibility allows them 

to handle their role in responding to and supporting zoonotic disease outbreak investigations. FDA believes that its veterinarian 

workforce is sufficient to address current needs, but they will continue to work through the Department to ensure that veterinary 

resources are appropriate to fulfill anticipated future needs. 

In contrast to FDA, successful recruitment and retention of veterinarians at the National Institutes of Health poses a particular 

challenge to its workforce needs for the biomedical research enterprise. Veterinarians at the NIH must have board specialization in 

laboratory animal medicine and veterinary pathology and/or an advanced degree in a basic science discipline to pursue a research career path in the biomedical sciences. 

As you would suspect, very few recent veterinary graduates are 

interested in accruing additional debt immediately upon graduation 

in order to enter an additional and demanding residency program. 

I believe this disincentive is compounded by the realization that 

their veterinary training experience was predominately to prepare 

them for traditional clinic veterinary medicine, not biomedical research or laboratory animal medicine. 

Consequently, the NIH Intramural Research Program is experiencing a critical shortage of veterinarians to support the agency’s 

broader biomedical research mission. If this shortage continues, it 

will also have a negative impact on an operating program in my 

office, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). BARDA’s mission is to move the most promising 

medical countermeasures to defend against chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear threats as well as pandemic influenza and 

other emerging infectious diseases from the research and development phase at NIH and elsewhere to advanced development and 

FDA licensure. Like the NIH, BARDA is also dependent upon the 

unique veterinary specialties in laboratory animal medicine, veterinary pathology, and comparative medicine. 

Veterinarians in the CDC work on the multidisciplinary public 

health team to identify, prevent, and control public health threats 

through applied epidemiology, laboratory animal medicine, toxicology, surveillance, field and clinical investigations, and humananimal interface research, either through direct hands-on work or 

through technical assistance and consultation to State and local 

public health stakeholders. For example, CDC veterinarians work 

with our Federal partners to identify potential risks associated 

with importation of animals and animal products that may cause 

human disease and they monitor the occurrence and progression of 

infectious diseases within wildlife and waterfowl. 

Veterinarians bring a unique perspective and breadth of scientific knowledge to the applied public health team. They are a valuable and unique resource and must be maintained with continued 

recruitment, retention, and training opportunities as they face 

similar challenges that I mentioned for the NIH. 

8 

1The prepared statement of Ms. Crumpacker appears in the Appendix on page 59. 

Within HHS, the ASPR, my office, provides the mechanism for 

a coordinated Federal response to supplement State, local, Territorial, and Tribal resources in response to public health and medical care needs through Emergency Support Function 8, under the 

National Response Framework. This may include veterinary or animal health issues for potential or actual emergencies or major disasters, in which we play a support role to provide veterinary medical services to mass care, urban search and rescue, and agricultural. 

Veterinary assets available within HHS that may be mobilized in 

response to a disaster include the National Veterinary Response 

Teams as part of the National Disaster Medical System, the U.S. 

Public Health Commissioned Corps Officers, which constitute over 

6,000 health professionals. And although there are only 100 Commissioned Corps veterinarians at the current time, they have established themselves as critical members of that multidisciplinary 

public health team for domestic deployments and more increasingly 

through international deployments for humanitarian assistance 

and health diplomacy. 

In addition to HHS assets, we can also call upon assets in the 

Department of Defense to help in natural disasters. 

In conclusion, veterinarians serve key roles as scientists and program leaders in the HHS medical and public health enterprise. 

Veterinarians with advanced degree training and experience in the 

biomedical sciences and public health, as well as specialty training 

and credentials in laboratory animal medicine and veterinary pathology, are critical to the Department’s biomedical research and 

emergency public health enterprise. 

Thank you for your time and your interest in this subject, and 

I will answer any of your questions. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you, Dr. Parker. Now we will receive the 

statement of Ms. Crumpacker. 

TESTIMONY OF JILL M. CRUMPACKER,1 DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF 

HUMAN CAPITAL MANAGEMENT, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 

Ms. CRUMPACKER. Chairman Akaka and Ranking Member Voinovich, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today on 

behalf of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), to update 

you on our activities regarding our Federal veterinarian workforce. 

My comments highlight the written testimony provided to you. 

As you have mentioned, Mr. Chairman, USDA is the largest employer of the nearly 3,000 veterinarians in the Federal Government. To date, our mission areas that employ veterinarians have 

implemented the full range of Federal workforce flexibilities available, including recruitment bonuses, referral and retention allowances, flexible work schedules, student loan repayments, and most 

recently, attainment of indefinite direct hire appointing authority 

from OPM. 

Challenges remain, including most notably demand for veterinarians that significantly outpaces supply, changing demographics 

9 

1The prepared statement of Dr. McGinn appears in the Appendix on page 64. 

within the profession, stressful and remote work conditions, and 

competition with the private sector. 

Even so, USDA continues its efforts to attract veterinarians. To 

this end, we are revamping our department-wide Human Resources 

Leadership Council to identify common issues among our agencies 

where we could leverage resources for training, development, and 

recruitment activities. We are using a model similar to NRC, by 

the way, Ranking Member. We are also working with OPM, initiating steps to obtain a government-wide salary survey, streamlining job announcements, and exploring the feasibility of an automated candidate search and qualifications screening tool. 

With respect to contingency or incident planning, USDA supports 

a total force approach. We continue to work closely with our State, 

local, academic, and association partners. We have engaged in 

training National Incident Management Teams, sought expansion 

and improvements to the National Animal Emergency Response 

Corps, updated our active pandemic plan, issued contingency plans 

for the use of foot and mouth disease vaccine while continuing to 

support development and application of new vaccine techniques. 

And we have continued to collaborate with our State, Federal, and 

local agencies in support of our mutual goals rooted in the Homeland Security Presidential Directives. 

Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, veterinarians are critical to 

the USDA core mission goals of protecting the Nation’s food supply 

and protecting the health of U.S. livestock. While the challenges of 

achieving a full force Federal veterinarian workforce are many, our 

ultimate goal is to be able to remove this occupation from our 

USDA mission critical High-Risk List. To that end, we appreciate 

your continued interest in addressing these challenges. 

This concludes my statement. I will be glad to respond to any 

questions you or the Ranking Member may have. Thank you. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you, Ms. Crumpacker. And now we will 

receive the statement of Dr. McGinn. 

TESTIMONY OF THOMAS J. McGINN, III, DVM,1 CHIEF VETERINARIAN AND DIRECTOR, FOOD, AGRICULTURE, AND VETERINARY DEFENSE DIVISION, OFFICE OF HEALTH AFFAIRS AND 

OFFICE OF THE CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

Dr. MCGINN. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member Voinovich. On behalf of Secretary Napolitano, I would like to 

thank you for your leadership in the protection and ensuring the 

security of our country. I would also like to thank the more than 

3,000 Federal veterinarians and their State, local, and academic 

partners serving every day to protect our Nation. The GAO is to 

be commended for this report, as well. 

The protection of animal and public health by the Federal veterinary workforce is built upon two solemn oaths. The first oath, as 

a Federal employee, to support and defend the Constitution. The 

second oath, as a veterinarian, to use our knowledge and skills to 

the benefit of society through the protection of animal health and 

10 

the promotion of public health. The commonality of these two oaths 

is protection. 

Though few in number, the veterinarians employed in DHS are 

engaged in all aspects of homeland security, including research, 

countermeasure development, policy development, working animal 

care, border protection, infrastructure protection, intelligence, and 

surveillance. DHS veterinarians embrace the one health concept 

that unites the health security of people, animals, and the environment. 

The veterinary workforce also has a direct impact on our Nation’s ability to protect the critical infrastructure of food and agriculture that account for one in six of American jobs. The veterinary 

workforce protects animal and public health in the face of catastrophic incidences. This is why it is essential that we, one, determine the veterinary resources needed for a catastrophic event; two, 

better utilize our constrained resources; and three, support the development of the veterinary workforce to ensure recovery through 

enhanced national resilience. 

Catastrophic incidences could include an intentional food contamination that stretches across the Nation’s food supply chain, 

creating overwhelming morbidity and mortality, a pandemic resulting in a 40 percent reduction in the workforce, or an outbreak of 

foot and mouth disease across as many as 30 States. Such events 

could strain our current veterinary workforce to the point where 

States could no longer send veterinarians to other States and the 

Federal workforce would be strained. 

After a 2002 outbreak of exotic Newcastle disease in only three 

States, Dr. Ron DeHaven, former Administrator of APHIS, stated, 

‘‘Even with exceptional collaboration between State and Federal 

agencies and industry, the exotic Newcastle outbreak taxed our 

human resources to the max. If there had been a second regional 

outbreak or, worse, a national animal health emergency, we simply 

would not have been able to respond.’’ 

If it had been 30 States instead of three, what are the resources 

that we would need and where would they come from? My first recommendation, we must determine the requirements and then clearly delineate the tasks and capabilities that must be filled by the 

Federal, State, local, and Tribal governments as well as the private 

citizens and veterinarians. More should be done and DHS recommends a comprehensive and detailed study across all levels of 

government and the private sector to determine what are the requirements for a veterinary workforce to respond to a catastrophic 

incident. 

But we do not need a new study to confidently state that the current veterinary workforce is inadequate for catastrophic incidences. 

The GAO report found that 12 of 17 agencies did not have sufficient veterinarians to address zoonotic outbreaks and to fulfill their 

day-to-day responsibilities. 

My second recommendation is to better utilize our constrained 

resources by growing and training the Nation’s veterinary workforce to effectively implement the National Incident Management 

System and provide veterinarians with a measured and clear understanding of the critical responsibilities in the event of a catastrophe. 

11 

Through veterinary workforce planning, education, training exercises, and lessons learned, we can build national resiliency, the 

ability to bend and not break. To effectively recover and continue 

to feed our Nation will require a robust and cohesive veterinary 

workforce. 

My third recommendation, support the development of a veterinary workforce that ensures recovery and builds national resilience 

and protects our domestic food supply. We must advance border 

screening programs, educational programs, private sector risk reducing strategies, surveillance programs, and the development of 

countermeasures for national security. If our national veterinary 

workforce is not operating effectively during a food, agricultural, or 

veterinary catastrophic event, then our Nation is at risk of dependency on a foreign food supply. 

In closing, significant progress has been made, but we have much 

more collaborative work to do. 

Thank you again for the opportunity to testify and I will be 

happy to take any questions. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Dr. McGinn. 

I have questions for the panel. This one is for Dr. McGinn and 

Dr. Parker. It is clear to me that veterinarians play a crucial role 

in our Nation’s food security, public health, and homeland security. 

What are the most significant risks if there are not enough Federal 

veterinarians to respond to catastrophic events such as foot and 

mouth disease or zoonotic disease outbreaks? Dr. Parker. 

Dr. PARKER. Well, I think there is significant risk to our Nation’s 

security and public health unless we are able to marshal some of 

the resources and begin to channel some of the currently available 

veterinarians in the country that make careers in public health, 

make careers in biomedical research, and so forth more attractive 

and competitive compared to elsewhere that they may go. 

Within HHS, sometimes it is hard to just categorize and count 

who actually falls in the veterinary roles because veterinarians in 

our Department actually serve as scientists on teams. And so sometimes it is not only the veterinarians, but it is also the entire scientific team that we also have to factor in as our critical workforce 

in addition to veterinarians. 

But veterinarians bring an extremely unique educational experience and background and they have established themselves as just 

critical components of a broader and larger applied public health 

team. They have established themselves as a very necessary component of the biomedical research and development enterprise. And 

so, unless we are able to solve some of these problems, we are 

going to be lacking in the necessary skill set and unique background that they bring from the entire enterprise, from basic research to advanced development, procurement of medical countermeasures, and deployment of countermeasures broadly to help our 

Nation respond to a catastrophic event. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you, Doctor. Dr. McGinn. 

Dr. MCGINN. I would just echo his comments and add that our 

Nation’s human health is at risk and our animal health is at risk 

in those sorts of situations. He did an excellent job of describing 

that. 

12 

In addition, our jobs are at risk. I mentioned one in six jobs are 

in this food and agricultural area. In both of your States, more 

than 10 percent of the workforce is in the restaurant and the food 

service area and agriculture is No. 1 in Ohio in terms of its economic value. So the economy is also at risk in terms of those sorts 

of things. So we don’t want to be in a position where we go through 

a catastrophic event and we end up with a situation where we actually put this infrastructure at risk and the impacts are such that 

we actually are hurting these particular jobs and also being more 

dependent on a foreign supply of food. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. 

Ms. Kichak, in GAO’s report, FSIS maintained that despite its 

veterinarian shortage, the agency has been able to meet its food 

safety and other responsibilities by redistributing the workforce. 

However, the Office of Personnel Management’s memorandum approving direct hire authority government-wide for Federal veterinary medical officers at the GS–11 through 15 levels referenced the 

severe shortage of Food Safety and Inspection Service veterinarians. In your view, is there a veterinarian shortage at FSIS that 

may adversely affect public health or food safety if left unsolved? 

Ms. KICHAK. We based the direct hire authority, which is given 

when you have a critical shortage of folks, on our analysis of the 

vacant positions cited in the GAO report, the movement of veterinarians out of that agency that we capture in our central database. 

So we are not the experts in how many veterinarians a department 

needs in order to complete their mission. We rely on them for that 

analysis. But what we do know is that they have not been filling 

the positions that they seek to fill. That is how we made our determination. 

Senator AKAKA. Ms. Shames, the GAO report revealed that several veterinarians working in slaughter plants said that they were 

not always able to meet their responsibilities and perform highquality work because of inadequate staffing. Could you please provide further information about how many FSIS veterinarians 

brought this to your attention? 

Ms. SHAMES. GAO actually visited several slaughterhouses, so 

we were able to interview the veterinarians firsthand. They told us 

directly, that it is very hard for them to meet not only their food 

safety responsibilities, but also their responsibilities regarding the 

humane handling and slaughter of animals. 

What the veterinarians told us is that there are shortages, and 

pressures on their time to be able to meet these responsibilities. 

What we know from the FSIS data is that for the last decade, there 

have been high vacancy rates. They haven’t been able to meet their 

hiring goals. In some of the districts, the vacancy rates have been 

as high as 35 percent. 

Senator AKAKA. Dr. Parker, according to the GAO report, a 2007 

Food and Drug Administration Science Advisory Report concluded 

that the Center for Veterinary Medicine was in a state of crisis because of inadequate staffing, training, and resources. What are 

your plans to work with this and other component agencies to ensure that HHS’s strategic workforce plan better addresses your Department’s challenges? 

13 

Dr. PARKER. Well, first, and I think as you know from the FDA’s 

reply to that finding, there was some disagreement that the Center 

for Veterinary Medicine is in a state of crisis with regard to that 

2007 report. That 2007 report looked at the overall scientific workforce and not specifically the veterinary workforce. 

Nonetheless, in any event, there have been a lot of efforts underway at FDA since then to improve recruitment of veterinarians, to 

provide new training opportunities and professional growth opportunities for the veterinarians that they do attract. Although the 

FDA feels at the current time their workforce of veterinarians is 

sufficient to meet the current needs, I will be working with them 

very closely. And they will be working with the Department very 

closely so we can better anticipate what any future needs are going 

to be that may expand beyond just the Center for Veterinary Medicine, but also include the broader food safety and other missions 

in FDA that support licensure of medical countermeasures necessary for the emergency public health medical countermeasure enterprise. 

I can do that, actually, through our Enterprise Governance Board 

(EGB) that we have established to help us provide strategic guidance to public health emergency matters. The EGB includes my 

boss, the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response 

(ASPR), the CDC Director, the NIH Director, and the FDA Commissioner. One of the things that I am taking on to do is making 

sure that as our operating divisions within HHS—as you know, we 

are very decentralized—but through this executive body, we can 

help ensure that the operating divisions most pertinent to this mission are taking the workforce of the veterinarians into consideration when they do their operating division workforce analysis. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. 

Let me ask Ms. Shames for any comments on HHS’s response. 

Ms. SHAMES. Yes. We quote explicitly from FDA’s own Science 

Advisory Board report that the Center for Veterinary Medicine is 

in a state of crisis. That is the phrase that they used. That group 

is responsible for the veterinarian medicine as well as for the animal feed, so it is a very important mission. So we don’t mischaracterize. We don’t exaggerate. We quoted directly from their report. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. Senator Voinovich, your questions? 

Senator VOINOVICH. First of all, either you or some of your predecessors didn’t do a very good job during the last number of years 

to deal with the human capital problem that we have. Either reports that came out were inadequate so that the Office of Personnel 

Management didn’t know what the situation was, and if they were 

and OPM didn’t pay attention to them and should have, then 

shame on OPM. 

But it seems to me that OPM’s job should be to look out across 

the Federal Government and look at where you have crises like we 

have today—this is a big crisis, this is probably one of the biggest 

crises we have today in the Federal Government—and to say to 

those people, take advantage of the direct hire authority that we 

have and we will grant it for you. Or in the alternative, the agencies themselves should have known about the direct hire and said, 

we need the direct hire so that we can go out and get the job done. 

14 

I don’t really care about the past, but I want to know, what are 

we going to do about the future? What are we going to do about 

the future? If I ask you to come back here to this Subcommittee, 

Senator Akaka and I, 6 months from now, what would you all do 

to come back to tell us what it is that you need to do in order to 

deal with this problem? Now, we are going to have other witnesses 

from the private sector. What are they going to do to help it? There 

is no question about it. We need more veterinarians, don’t we? For 

sure. All right. How do we get them? 

The next issue is, once they are there, how do we hire them? You 

just talked about getting to GS–11, $49,000. If I go to work for a 

university, I get at least $28,000 more money. If I go to work for 

a pharmaceutical company, I can get as much as $96,000 more 

than to come to work for the Federal Government. I don’t know 

what the retention rate here is. People come to work for you. Probably another job comes along and they get out of here. I would like 

for somebody to give me the retention rate that you have of your 

veterinarians here. 

So it seems to me the salary level is not competitive. I don’t 

know what happens over at the Office of Management and Budget, 

but how many of your directors go over there and say, hey, folks, 

we can’t get the job done with this salary level. We can’t be competitive. Somebody ought to be looking at the fact that you have 

got movement from one agency to another because they pay more 

money in another agency than they do in the other agency that 

they work at. 

Tell me what you would all do to put something together, we can 

come back in 6 months and let us know what is it that you think 

needs to be done in order to deal with this problem, short-term, 

middle-term, and long-term. 

Senator AKAKA. Dr. Parker. 

Dr. PARKER. Those are all excellent comments and really cut to 

the heart of the matter. But if I may be so bold to at least start 

off the conversation, to propose at least, as I have been thinking 

about the problem and the dilemma, what may be more longerterm solutions and rely, in fact, on maybe the experience that 

helped me through my career and bring up a model that I think 

has been extremely effective in recruiting, training, providing educational opportunities, and channeling the subspecialties needed in 

veterinary medicine to the national security, homeland security 

needs, I will speak about the programs that the military, specifically, and the Army, in particular, had for such a long time. I think 

that is a model program for successfully bringing in young graduates into the Federal service. 

What was critical about that program was the opportunity at the 

time, at least in my experience, the Health Professions Scholarship 

that defrayed the costs and expenses of veterinary college but also 

began to target some of that early basic training environment in 

veterinary college, that led me to think about public service in veterinary college as opposed to purely private practice. 

That, then, coupled with the opportunity for more advanced 

training, after you experienced your worth in Federal service and 

in military service, for further advanced degree training in a subVerDate Nov 24 2008 12:01 Jan 14, 2010 Jkt 049491 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\49491.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
15 

specialty, be it laboratory animal medicine, be it comparative pathology, be it in my case physiology, a Ph.D. degree program. 

So that model coupled with a scholarship program for veterinary 

college, work experience, advanced degree training, yes, plus leadership training and other military-type training—and that leadership training is critical—led to the development of a pipeline and 

a career progression for a cohort of professionals. And this is not 

only true or appropriate for the veterinary corps, but it was also 

true and worked for the rest of the health professions, in my case, 

in the Army Medical Department. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Excuse me. I am planning on introducing 

legislation to provide additional scholarships to students in exchange for public service. What I would like to do is I would like 

to give you all copies of this legislation. I would like you to look 

at it and tell me what you think is good and what is bad and how 

we could do it better. 

But the question that I would like to have is you say you have 

a model. But what I would like to know, Ms. Shames, if you, as 

a GAO person, who would you have in the room to get the consensus of the folks about what needs to be done? I think the private sector should also be in that room, but who would be in that 

room to sit down and start to come back with these recommendations? 

Ms. SHAMES. Well, as a starting point, we feel that both USDA 

and HHS should get a better understanding of what is going on 

within their own departments. And so I think the first steps should 

be the human capital officers from their component agencies to 

clearly explain exactly what is going on in their departments. We 

talked about FSIS, for example, as well as FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine. Even though strategic human capital management 

has been on GAO’s High-Risk List since 2001, as has been noted, 

I have to say we were surprised that at the department level they 

appear to be unaware of what was going on in their own backyards. 

Senator VOINOVICH. One of the reasons why we got the CHCO 

Council and upgraded it and told all of the departments that they 

ought to give human capital a larger priority and that it should be 

part of their annual report to the Federal Government was to elevate this thing, and I would be really interested, who are the chief 

human capital officers? How many of them have gone to the CHCO 

Council meetings? 

Ms. SHAMES. Those are good questions, and I think as a starting 

point, they need to get a basic understanding of what the challenges are with their component agencies. 

Senator VOINOVICH. So you would have representatives—just a 

final note. Who would be at the table? 

Ms. SHAMES. I would say their own members from their component agencies. It certainly helps to get external views from the 

other veterinarian stakeholders, certainly to try to generate ideas 

with the academic community and private sector would certainly 

help. I think generating ideas is always a good thing, but as a 

starting point, you need to understand what the challenges are 

within your—— 

16 

Senator VOINOVICH. Which one of these agencies should convene 

the meeting? 

Ms. SHAMES. Well, I think OPM ought to be a catalyst with all 

of this. We have talked for a long time that OPM has a leadership 

responsibility, and between OPM and the departments, there ought 

to be a shared responsibility of who is to do what. That was another reason for GAO putting human capital on the High-Risk List. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Chairman, I am out of time, but I would 

like to suggest that maybe we ask this group of people here to start 

and come back to us maybe in a month or 2 months with a plan 

of how people are going to get together and hear from the folks who 

are really doing the work about how we go about dealing with this 

problem so we have an idea they are getting together, and then 

maybe set a date for them to come back to us, say in 6 months, 

with a plan that is going to deal with this, as I mentioned, on a 

short-term, middle-term, and long-term basis. 

Ms. KICHAK. We do have a meeting scheduled for March 16. At 

this time, we envisioned inviting every agency that employs veterinarians at the component and agency-wide level. That is March 16. 

That is scheduled. We had not intended to include private sector 

people at that time, but we are reconsidering that position. 

Senator VOINOVICH. You are the boss, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator AKAKA. I am glad to hear that a meeting has been set 

up. I agree with Senator Voinovich that we should have a followup session with you and to see where you are maybe after the 

March 16 meeting. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Chairman, we may not even have to 

have a hearing. Maybe we could just have them in your office and 

have them come in and tell us what they are doing and then say, 

come back to us in 6 months and then we will have a hearing and 

tell us where we are going. 

Senator AKAKA. All right. Well, we will figure that one out. Ms. 

Crumpacker. 

Ms. CRUMPACKER. As far as the USDA, we accept what the report says and we hear the message. You mentioned NRC and Mr. 

McDermott has been a leader and he certainly is a model for us 

to look at. We have separate agencies who have done a yeoman’s 

job to the extent they can with their assessments. What we need 

to do at a department level is take those assessments and look at 

them overall, and then recognizing that those are mission critical 

occupations, they are tied directly to the mission of our Department, how do we leverage resources across mission areas? How 

does the Department provide leadership departmentally rather 

than what we have done, which is leadership for each mission area, 

working with OPM, but we need to take it another step as you 

have written and as you have said, to look at it as a USDA public 

service corps. 

So that is what our commitment will be, and revamping our HR 

Leadership Council of our highest-ranking HR officers in each mission area, they are all just chomping at the bit, basically, to be able 

to start working towards that issue. We recognize we need to do 

something. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Good. Thanks, Senator Akaka. 

17 

Senator AKAKA. There is no question that our Federal Government is facing a huge challenge, not only for veterinarians but 

throughout the system, and this is where I look at OPM and want 

to ask that question. What are we doing to deal with the vacancies 

that will come to the Federal Government in a few years, when 

many of our Federal workers will be retiring? Will we have the 

workforce to operate our government? 

So we need to really seriously get to this, and Senator Voinovich 

is a champion of this. We are going to be looking at this to see how, 

if we need to, we can try to bring together the different agencies 

and departments to deal with this, because we really have to find 

answers. It is not only for me. It is not only the economic crisis; 

it is also going to be a crisis of personnel in the government. 

What are we doing about it? I think we really need to take steps 

to begin to deal with this. 

Let me move on to another area of all of this. A pandemic outbreak would stress the capacity of Federal veterinarians, public 

health professionals, and others, and would require an integrated 

response across all levels of government and with the private sector, as well. I have long been concerned that our Nation is not prepared adequately for a pandemic and I have held a series of hearings on this issue. 

What are Federal veterinarians doing to prepare for the coordinated response that would be needed during a pandemic or widespread animal disease outbreak, and what more should be done? 

Dr. PARKER. I will go ahead and start, if you would like. First, 

thank you for bringing this issue up. I just want to first say I believe that one of our growing threats that we have is complacency 

that, in fact, this is a real threat, and it is a real threat. But that 

aside, there has been tremendous work done over the last several 

years in pandemic preparedness planning, whether that be in the 

R&D phase, the development of new and better medical countermeasures, such as pre-pandemic, pandemic vaccines, antivirals, 

stockpiles of antivirals, and then the planning activities necessary 

to distribute and dispense these medical countermeasures in the 

event of a sustained human transmission of H5N1 or another virus 

like that. 

Veterinarians, at least in HHS, play a key role on every component and phase of that enterprise I just described. They are critical 

members of that public health team, from research to deployment, 

platforms of public health assistance to State and local authorities. 

But there continues to be a lot to do, a lot of issues to work out. 

This is, planning and preparedness is always dynamic. And the 

more planning and exercises that we do—you dig deeper into the 

onion and new issues arise, such as how do we do risk-based border 

screening? So we are really getting down to some of the details of 

how we might do this and how we might deploy not only Federal 

folks, but to work most importantly in an integrated fashion nationally. We are defining better what are our Federal responsibilities, what are our State responsibilities, what are our local responsibilities, what are our private sector responsibilities, and most important, what are our responsibilities as individuals and families, 

as well. 

18 

Senator AKAKA. Dr. McGinn, would you comment on this question, too? 

Dr. MCGINN. Obviously, a pandemic would result in a greatly 

limited workforce, so it makes it more essential that we are then 

coordinated more effectively. DHS is working that coordinated role 

across all the different departments and with the State, the local, 

and the private sector, as well. 

Being able to actually build that ability to coordinate requires 

that we get down to the place where we delineate exactly what are 

the tasks that are necessary to be done by each, Federal, State, 

local, Tribal, and the private sector. The private sector contribution 

is huge in a greatly limited workforce situation. So being able to 

understand the contribution of the private veterinarian—what 

USDA has done with the private veterinarians in developing a 

cadre of veterinarians to do that. HHS also has some private veterinary capability, as well, but you will hear from the AVMA and 

some of what they have done, the State Animal Response Teams. 

Being able to understand and delineate exactly what each one of 

these private sector contributions to the veterinary workforce can 

be then helps us better understand what we need the Federal veterinarians to do, as well. 

Veterinarians work that interface between the human and animal and the environmental, so we understand that if we can prevent a pandemic by getting out there around the world and working with the current avian influenza-type situations, then we are 

also doing what we can do to prevent and respond to these sorts 

of catastrophic events, as well. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. Senator Voinovich, any more questions for this panel? 

Senator VOINOVICH. No, I haven’t any. Has the vote started yet? 

I have no other questions, and maybe we can get the other witnesses to have a chance, unless you have more questions, Mr. 

Chairman. 

Senator AKAKA. All right. Well, I have further questions, but I 

will submit them for the record. 

I want to thank all of you on the first panel. You can see how 

important this question is to our country and the need to get together, get the information correct, but more importantly, to begin 

to build programs so that we can deal with these vacancies, not 

only for veterinarians but for many other positions in the Federal 

Government. So I want to thank you. Senator Voinovich and I will 

be thinking of you, and don’t be surprised when you get a call from 

us. Thank you very much to the first panel. 

Let me advise the second panel that we will take a recess. We 

will take this vote and then we will be back. When we are done 

with the votes, we will be back. This hearing is recessed. 

[Recess.] 

Senator AKAKA. The hearing of this Subcommittee will come to 

order. 

I want to welcome the second panel of witnesses: Dr. Ron 

DeHaven, Chief Executive Officer, American Veterinary Medical 

Association; Dr. Gilsdorf, Executive Vice President of the National 

Association of Federal Veterinarians; and Dr. Pappaioanou, Executive Director, Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges. 

19 

1The prepared statement of Dr. DeHaven appears in the Appendix on page 80. 

You may know that it is the custom of this Subcommittee to 

swear in all witnesses and I would ask all of you to please stand 

and raise your right hand. 

Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give 

this Subcommittee is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 

the truth, so help you, God? 

Dr. DEHAVEN. I do. 

Dr. GILSDORF. I do. 

Dr. PAPPAIOANOU. I do. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. Please be seated. Let the record note 

that our witnesses answered in the affirmative. 

Also, before we start, I want you to know that your full written 

statements will be made a part of the record. I would also like to 

remind you to keep your remarks brief, given the number of people 

testifying this afternoon, as well. 

So with that, Dr. DeHaven, will you please proceed with your 

statement? 

TESTIMONY OF W. RON DEHAVEN, DVM, MBA,1 CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, AMERICAN VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION 

Dr. DEHAVEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the 

Subcommittee. I am Dr. Ron DeHaven, Chief Executive Officer of 

the American Veterinary Medical Association. I really appreciate 

the opportunity to testify before you today on the state of our Nation’s veterinary workforce. 

While the general public often associates veterinarians with the 

care of their pets, this report highlights the critical role of veterinarians to protect the health of our livestock, the safety of our food, 

and ultimately the health of our public. The AVMA is pleased to 

have the report confirm our long-held concerns about the widespread shortage of food supply veterinarians. Population growth 

and growing dependence on animal protein will continue to put increased demands on our food supply system and on those veterinarians who are responsible for its security, safety, and quality. 

Unfortunately, there are simply not enough veterinarians to 

meet this demand and the causes of the shortage are many and 

they are complex. The 28 accredited veterinary colleges in the 

United States graduate about 2,600 veterinarians each year, and 

that number has remained relatively stagnant for about two decades. This lack of growth in veterinary graduates is not due to a 

lack of applicants. To the contrary, our veterinary schools are operating at full capacity with qualified applicants outnumbering the 

number of seats by a number of three-to-one. 

AVMA shares concerns expressed in the report about the inadequate level of pay for Federal veterinarians. Multiple Federal 

agencies cited noncompetitive salaries as an issue relative to recruiting and retaining qualified veterinarians. Educational debt is 

also playing a role in this shortage. The National Veterinary Medical Services Act exchanges debt relief for commitments of service. 

This legislation was passed in 2003. However, no benefits have 

been realized due to limitations in funding, delays in implementaVerDate Nov 24 2008 12:01 Jan 14, 2010 Jkt 049491 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\49491.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
20 

1The prepared statement of Dr. Gilsdorf with an attachment appears in the Appendix on page 

88. 

tion, and the fact that the loan payments will be taxable income. 

As it stands today, about 46 veterinarians could benefit from the 

program. If payments under this program were made tax-exempt, 

the number of participants would increase to 75. 

Although many veterinarians benefiting from a robust loan repayment program might ultimately find their way to work in the 

private sector, these would be the same veterinarians who are often 

called upon into action by Federal and State agencies during large 

animal health disease outbreaks. An increase in the numbers 

would not only improve our ability to fulfill daily responsibilities to 

animal and human health, it would also add to the existing National Animal Health Emergency Response Corps and thereby help 

the government in the event of an animal disease emergency or a 

natural disaster. 

Mr. Chairman, we are all keenly aware that these are especially 

tough economic times for our country, but as the old adage goes, 

we can pay now or we can pay later, and if we choose the latter, 

the cost will be exponentially higher. The cost of expanding our veterinary schools providing debt relief to our graduating veterinarians and increasing the salaries of Federal veterinarians pales in 

comparison to the potentially huge costs associated with animal 

and human disease outbreaks. 

In conclusion, the findings of the GAO report present us with significant challenges and opportunities. I am confident that by working together, we can address these challenges, welcome many more 

bright minds into the veterinary profession, and provide our citizens the level of food safety and security that they expect and deserve. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you for your statement. Dr. Gilsdorf, 

please proceed with your statement. 

TESTIMONY OF MICHAEL GILSDORF, DVM,1 EXECUTIVE VICE 

PRESIDENT, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FEDERAL VETERINARIANS 

Dr. GILSDORF. Mr. Chairman and Subcommittee Members, thank 

you for holding this important hearing on the Federal veterinary 

workforce. 

As you know, veterinarians are a small but vital part of the Federal workforce. Out of the 78,000 veterinarians working in the 

United States, only 3,016 work for the Federal Government. They 

are educated and trained in a complex array of scientific and medical disciplines. Their training makes them uniquely qualified, 

more than any other health profession in the Federal Government, 

to protect America’s animal agriculture and wildlife and to protect 

humans from zoonotic and foodborne diseases. In fact, when it 

comes to ensuring food safety, humane animal care, preventing animal disease incursions, and managing animal and zoonotic diseases, it is the Federal veterinarian who is on the front line. 

Because of increased food safety and bioterrorism issues, Federal 

agencies need a more robust veterinary workforce that is highly 

21 

1The prepared statement of Dr. Pappaioanou appears in the Appendix on page 99. 

skilled and ready to serve, both under normal circumstances and 

in catastrophic events. At the present time, there are not enough 

veterinarians to adequately respond to the Nation’s needs. In fact, 

Federal managers have personally shared with me their difficulties 

in filling the existing vacancies as well as their fears about the inability to fill future vacancies. The current and future shortages of 

veterinarians are exacerbated by the fact that there will be more 

jobs in all areas of veterinary medicine than there are veterinarians to fill them. 

The NAFV agrees with the GAO that a government-wide assessment is necessary to determine how many veterinarians are needed. We further recommend that steps be taken to dramatically improve the compensation package for Federal veterinarians, which 

would include more effective and equitable incentives. 

Not only must salaries be more competitive, but professional development, continuing educational opportunities, and assistance in 

obtaining advanced degrees is also needed. The average salary of 

the Federal veterinarian is $37,000 less than those veterinarians 

who own their practice. The average difference is even greater 

when compared with the salaries earned by those working in academia and industry. 

Federal veterinarians are also not paid at the same level as other 

Federal medical personnel. Physicians and dentists and nurses are 

eligible for and receive special pay above and beyond their base salaries. Most Federal agencies do not have the statutory authority 

that provides the same special salaries for Federal veterinarians, 

so as you had asked the previous group, as far as I am concerned, 

changing the U.S. Code to put in specialty pay for veterinarians 

would be one step that could be taken. 

These special statutory authorities are needed for veterinarians. 

All Federal medical personnel, including veterinarians, provide essential medical services to sustain and improve the public and 

human health and therefore should be compensated equitably. If 

the Federal agencies do not do this, then I foresee that they will 

continue to face challenges in recruiting and retaining adequate 

numbers in the Federal workforce. 

Mr. Chairman, on behalf of the NAFV, I appreciate the attention 

that is being given to this issue and your help in improving incentives to recruit and retain Federal veterinarians. It is our sincere 

desire that these important challenges be remedied in a timely 

fashion. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Dr. Gilsdorf. And now we 

will hear from Dr. Pappaioanou. Will you please begin. 

TESTIMONY OF MARGUERITE PAPPAIOANOU, DVM, MPVM, 

PH.D., DIP ACVPM,1 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ASSOCIATION OF 

AMERICAN VETERINARY MEDICAL COLLEGES 

Dr. PAPPAIOANOU. Good afternoon, Chairman Akaka. I am Marguerite Pappaioanou, a retired veterinary commissioned officer of 

the U.S. Public Health Service and Executive Director of the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges, which represents 

all 28 colleges of veterinary medicine in the United States, along 

22 

with several U.S. departments of veterinary science and comparative medicine. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. 

A national veterinarian workforce shortage is impacting the 

numbers of veterinarians going into the Federal workforce. The 

number of U.S. veterinary colleges and graduating class size has 

not changed for over 25 years, save for a single school in California 

that was established in the 1990s, despite an increase in our country’s population of approximately 78 million people. Our 28 colleges, located in 26 States, are a national resource worthy of Federal investment as their collective 2,600 graduates per year benefit 

our entire U.S. population across all 50 States and Territories. 

Our colleges understand the need to produce more veterinarians 

and stand ready to begin to address this need. For several years, 

however, we have been advocating for Federal resources to complement State funding that would permit our colleges to increase 

their class size substantially. With approximately 6,000 students 

applying each year, we do have extremely bright, qualified students 

to fill bigger class sizes. 

Program-wise, 22 of our 28 colleges offer programs and/or joint 

degrees in public health. Every other year, we take 300 to 400 enthusiastic students to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to learn about disease outbreaks and careers in public health. 

Each summer, with industry and NIH, 300 veterinary students 

conduct biomedical research projects and learn about careers in 

biomedical research. Also each year, USDA supports veterinary 

students to travel to Plum Island to learn about foreign animal diseases and their prevention and control. 

Despite this great interest by our veterinary medical students in 

these areas and in these programs, the Federal Government loses 

them to private clinical practice, industry, and academia, where the 

salaries are much higher. We ask that Congress take the following 

actions to address the workforce shortage. 

First, ensure the GAO’s recommendations are implemented fully, 

by including a regular assessment of the adequacy of the veterinary medical workforce. 

Second, provide funds for the construction of educational facilities at our colleges that will enable them to increase class sizes. 

Students are standing out in the hallways. There is just not 

enough room in the current facilities to increase class size. 

Third, appropriate greater levels of funding for tax-exempt 

awards under the National Veterinary Medical Services Act of 2003 

for loan repayment. 

Fourth, provide funds for scholarships to veterinary students 

pursuing public health or advanced research degrees and to ensure 

that these programs for graduate research degrees are available to 

veterinarians. Often, they are restricted to M.D.s. 

And last, ensure that Federal positions, personnel system grades, 

and salaries are at levels comparable to what veterinarians are 

earning in private clinical practice, industry, and academia, along 

with closing the gap between what veterinarians make and that of 

our other medical colleagues. 

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to 

visit today. I can assure you that the veterinary medical colleges 

23 

in the United States stand ready to work with Congress and other 

partners to begin to address this workforce shortage. Thank you. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you for your statement, Dr. Pappaioanou. 

Dr. DeHaven, in your testimony, you stated that this country is 

facing a crisis if we do not act and bolster our veterinary forces. 

Will you please describe the potential crisis you foresee? 

Dr. DEHAVEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the question. I 

think that crisis could take a number of forms. In my previous capacity, I was the Administrator of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, and so had largely primary responsibility for the 

response if there were a major animal disease outbreak. 

We estimated at the time that if there were an accidental introduction of foot and mouth disease in the United States, the cost 

would begin at $5 billion, and that would be if we were able to 

identify, contain, and eradicate the disease within 72 hours, and 

those numbers go up exponentially with every day and week and 

month that it would take us to contain and eradicate a disease outbreak such as that. In fact, our very economy could be held hostage 

to that kind of disease outbreak. 

It all depends on how quickly we are able to identify and respond 

to that outbreak, and that really gets down to the focal point, and 

that is the veterinary expertise, whether it is the laboratory diagnostician, the people in the field to quarantine and deal with the 

infected herds, and all of the associated activities. It all revolves 

around veterinarians. 

Senator AKAKA. Dr. Gilsdorf, you stated in your testimony that 

due to the existing veterinarian shortages, many Federal veterinarians are working up to 12 hours per day and may serve on emergency disease outbreak task forces for long periods of time, putting 

tremendous stress on their family lives. Which agencies are affected most by this challenge, and what impact might this have on 

public health? 

Dr. GILSDORF. The agencies most affected by this would be 

APHIS Veterinary Services and FSIS. 

As far as the impact on public health, we have situations, first 

of all, in FSIS, and it is stated in the GAO report, where veterinarians are working essentially three jobs, for three veterinarians, because they cannot fill those jobs. So they have the veterinarian 

driving from one plant to another, trying to keep up with the workload, and they are working long hours in order to do that. Now, you 

do have inspectors on the line and you do have consumer safety inspectors and so forth, but you do not have the veterinarian there 

as they should be to oversee what is going on on a constant basis. 

So I feel that is a problem. I think those veterinarians need to 

be there and do one job at a time and not try to do three at a time. 

I just don’t see how they can effectively manage those situations 

for long periods of time, and that is the biggest problem. These situations are occuring for long periods of time. These veterinarians 

just can’t continue to perform well for that long period of time. 

That is why you are seeing veterinarians leaving FSIS, going to 

APHIS or going to other places. This doesn’t occur in all districts 

within FSIS, but it does occur a lot more than it should. 

Within APHIS Veterinary Service activities, veterinarians work 

with disease eradication programs. I retired from APHIS. I worked 

24 

there for 33 years, and I was in charge of all the domestic programs at the staff level. These veterinarians work with disease 

eradication programs, and zoonotic disease eradication programs, 

such as avian influenza and tuberculosis. 

In those situations, those veterinarians, especially if they are 

called to work on disease eradication task forces, have to stop testing cattle for program diseases and work on an avian influenza or 

other disease task forces. It is not that those animals are going to 

be a public health threat because they are under quarantine, that 

is not a public health problem at that point. The issue of concern 

is that there might be more disease spread within the herd, and 

if any animals get out of the herd, then they could spread it to 

other herds over that extended length of time. I am not aware of 

that happening, but that is a potential problem in not continually 

working with those herds as they should be. 

Now, we have also had tuberculosis task forces in California and 

New Mexico where large numbers of veterinarians are there and 

are working long hours. In fact, I was told by one of our members 

that they tested 16,000 cows in one day on one dairy in the last 

couple of months. These veterinarians are really working hard to 

get the task force work completed so they can get back to their regular jobs. 

But the fact remains, there are not enough veterinarians in the 

agency to do the work. But again, when those veterinarians go on 

these task forces, it often strains the family relations because they 

are gone for such long periods of time and their spouse has to take 

care of the family, do all the chores, and so forth. And then, when 

the veterinarian gets back to their regular job, their workload in 

their regular job is backed up, so now they have to work harder 

on their regular job in order to catch up. So it does put a strain 

on their family life. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Doctor, for your statement. 

Let me ask Dr. Pappaioanou, during the 110th Congress, I cosponsored the Veterinary Public Health Workforce Expansion Act, 

introduced by Senator Wayne Allard. This bill would have created 

a competitive grant program that would have supported construction costs at veterinary schools. Although the Higher Education 

Opportunity Act of 2008 created a competitive grant program that 

included many of the provisions of the Public Health Workforce Expansion Act, it did not allow the funding of significant construction. 

To what extent would a grant program that supports needed construction costs help increase the number of veterinarians focused 

on public health-related matters? 

Dr. PAPPAIOANOU. Senator, that would be the No. 1 thing that 

the government could do that would enable our colleges to respond. 

They are ready, and they have been advocating for that legislation 

and we thank you so much for your support on that. We were very 

grateful, of course, for the Higher Education Opportunity Act that 

passed for the other resources that were made available, but when 

the funds for the construction were taken out, that just, again, 

stopped the ability of the colleges to increase class size. Many of 

them have class sizes of somewhere around 70, 80, 100 students 

per class and are poised to go to 150 or 200 students, but it is not 

25 

just simply lecture halls, although that is also a need, but it is 

teaching anatomy and pathology, and so very specialized facilities 

that are needed that if you add a substantial number of students 

into the class, that construction is absolutely at the core of the 

matter. This would be the No. 1 assist that the Federal Government could give that could really allow our colleges to increase 

those class sizes. 

We would be very willing to work with HHS, with Congress. I 

guess a comment that often has come up with the increasing class 

size is how will the colleges assure that the veterinarians, or that 

the new students coming in will go to these areas of need rather 

than to go into private practice or the other areas that they are 

gravitating towards and the colleges have put into place programs 

for recruitment and special training and mentoring and we are 

very willing, as I mentioned, to work with HHS and Congress to 

assure that increases that are achieved will find their way into 

these workforce shortage areas. 

Senator AKAKA. I want to ask each of you to think of three recommendations that would strengthening the Federal veterinarian 

workforce. I want you to be as specific as you can, coming from 

your area of jurisdiction and your expertise. If you would offer your 

three top recommendations for strengthening the Federal veterinarian workforce, I would certainly like to hear it now, beginning 

with Dr. DeHaven. 

Dr. DEHAVEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think we have many 

of the mechanisms in place already to do some of the work that is 

necessary to increase that workforce. The National Veterinary 

Medical Service Act, if we had implementing regulations in place 

that would allow for student debt repayment for those graduates 

that would go into a food animal practice, particularly into a remote area, would go a long way towards addressing that problem. 

If we can make those payments tax-exempt, we can increase by at 

least a third the number of participants who can benefit from that 

program. So I think that would be one incentive, one potential fix. 

Granted, many of those graduates will go into private practice, but 

in the event of an animal health emergency, those are the same 

people that help the government respond. 

The Veterinary Public Health Workforce Expansion Act that Dr. 

Pappaioanou just mentioned will also go a long way, increasing capacity at the veterinary schools, but not just increasing capacity for 

the sake of increasing the numbers but making sure that those students going into the schools, the additional students would go into 

the shortage areas—public health, food supply, veterinary medicine, laboratory animal medicine, and some of the critical shortage 

areas that really add to the veterinary food supply workforce. 

And then potentially some scholarship programs. We heard in 

the first panel programs at the military that, in essence, pay the 

entire cost associated with a veterinary degree in return for a time 

commitment to be in the military. That same kind of program, 

scholarship program, given the student debt that our veterinary 

graduates are coming out of school with, would go a long way to 

incentivize students to go into these critical shortage areas, again, 

particularly in the food supply, veterinary medicine arena. 

26 

So I think, Mr. Chairman, those are three areas that would go 

a long way towards addressing this problem. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much for that. Dr. Gilsdorf, your 

three recommendations, please. 

Dr. GILSDORF. OK. Well, I would agree with Dr. DeHaven’s suggestions and recommendations. I would add the No. 1 issue that I 

think would bring more veterinarians into the government and 

help us retain more veterinarians and even encourage fewer veterinarians to retire early is salary. There is just not an equity in salary at this point, as I have already pointed out earlier. 

The biggest problem with that is the veterinarians do not have 

the opportunity to get special pay, which other medical personnel 

in the government receive. And so if the statutory authorities could 

be obtained and the funding, of course, that would really encourage 

them to stay on board. 

For example, there are two specialty pays the Army offers right 

now. One is board certification, but board certification is not something that is offered in all the Federal agencies. In other agencies, 

people that are board certified do not get recognition. 

In addition to that, the military veterinarians get one other spe- cialty pay and that is $100 a month for being a veterinarian in the 

military. That has not changed since the mid-1950s or before. 

Whereas other medical personnel had started at that level, but now 

receive up to $1,000 or $1,200 a month. There is a discrepancy 

there and I don’t know why, but I do know the military veterinarians that I have talked with feel this is a big issue and that if this 

issue that could be taken care of and it would entice them to stay 

longer in the military. 

But again, those are two specialty pays that are already in place 

only in the military and not in other Federal agencies, except at 

Health and Human Services within NIH. HHS has some authorities within a small section of that agency to pay veterinarians specialty pay. That is less than 2 percent of the veterinary workforce. 

The majority of the agencies do not have the authority to pay special pay to veterinarians. 

The next suggestion would be professional development, and that 

includes everything from training courses in leadership to continuing education. A lot of our veterinarians want to maintain their 

State licenses so that they keep up with new technology, what is 

new in veterinary medicine, this requires continuing education 

every year, depending on the State, up to 20 to 40 hours per year. 

Many veterinarians want to continue maintaining their license. 

However, in agencies like FSIS, the veterinarians duties are already stretched so far that the agency can’t allow them to attend 

training courses because they don’t have anyone to replace them. 

Therefore, they don’t get those professional development opportunities. 

A lot of our veterinarians would also like to get advanced degrees 

and try to use those within the government to help advance the 

government. A lot of those opportunities are not there. 

And the last suggestion I have for increasing the Federal workforce is to look at hiring private veterinarians in some capacity. I 

know there are different efforts that are on board right now, but 

I think they need to be enhanced and strengthened. Thank you. 

27 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you for your more than three recommendations. 

Now, may I ask Dr. Pappaioanou for your three recommendations? 

Dr. PAPPAIOANOU. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Well, as we have 

discussed before, our first recommendation would be passage of the 

National Veterinary Medical Services Expansion Act to provide 

Federal funding for the construction of facilities that would allow 

our colleges to increase class sizes substantially. 

The second would be really looking at the student debt area of 

loan repayment programs and increasing the appropriation for the 

National Veterinary Medical Services Act of 2003 and making 

those awards tax exempt, and then on the other side, to provide 

scholarships for veterinarians now to go into areas of public health 

and advanced research degrees. 

When I am often out talking with our veterinary students about 

this, they want to go after degrees in public health. But when they 

are looking at an average debt load of $120,000 with a 4-year veterinary program, staying that additional year to incur an additional $35,000 or $50,000 of debt that it would take for an MPH 

and then—and I will get to the last point—they are wondering 

about the salaries and the jobs that they might end up in, it stops 

them from pursuing this option. That is a major challenge. 

So definitely debt repayment and scholarships. And often the 

programs that are developed for research degrees are aimed at 

physicians. I can’t tell you how many programs are advertized or 

posted, and as a veterinarian, you are all excited. You are looking 

at it and you think, boy, that is great, and then you see it is for 

physicians only. It happens all the time. So anything we can do to 

encourage HHS and USDA, any government program that is providing funding for advanced research degrees to include veterinary 

medical personnel as able to compete for and obtain that funding 

would be important. 

Last, education is not going to do it alone. Often, the question 

comes up by our students considering these areas, but what jobs 

are out there? We are not hearing about the jobs. We see job descriptions and they are for physicians. They are for nurses. They 

don’t say veterinarian, even though the jobs are those that veterinarians can do and actually do bring their special expertise to, 

such as Dr. Parker mentioned in his testimony. So there is no 

question but that making it clear what the jobs are, their salary, 

the incentive pay, retention, all of those things need to be sufficant 

and clear, so that the students see the opportunity. 

The interest is there. As I say, we have hundreds of students 

who go to CDC, who are doing research projects. It is phenomenal. 

But somehow between those programs and the time they leave, we 

have lost them, and so the job opportunities can’t be overemphasized in terms of getting them in. 

And then I would also just like to support Dr. Gilsdorf’s point on 

retention. To make this very real, and I will mention just a personal example, as I left the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where I worked for 21 years, my counterparts, those peers 

who were physicians, were making $50,000 a year more than me 

on three and four and five special pays. The only difference in our 

28 

training really was the M.D. and the DVM and the training was 

comparable. Research—too, I had more degrees than many of them 

did, and actually, there were junior people who worked for me that 

didn’t have graduate degrees, didn’t have 20 years of experience, 

hadn’t done research, no publications, compared to my resume, and 

they were making $30,000 a year more than me. 

Now, I got to 20 years, which is when I could retire, and I did. 

So the retention part of it didn’t work very well for me. Now, 

maybe CDC would say, well, we are glad that she left anyway. I 

humbly offer this as just one example that the numbers are very 

real and they really do matter greatly, not only in terms of getting 

people to come in, but also to stay. Thank you. 

Senator AKAKA. Well, thank you very much, all three of you, and 

Dr. Pappaioanou for your recommendations, as well. 

I would like to thank all of you again. You have addressed many 

of the most pressing workforce challenges facing Federal veterinarians. You also have provided many valuable recommendations to 

ensure that this vital workforce can meet its missions to support 

food safety, public health, and homeland security. You pointed out 

the important role that a veterinarian plays in this. 

I would like to emphasize once again that we need to take a strategic approach to resolving these critical issues, and that is our motive here. This involves making proactive, interagency cooperation 

to address workforce challenge, the rule and not the exception. 

The hearing record will be open for 1 week for additional statements or questions from other Members of this Subcommittee. 

But again, I want to tell you, you have been helpful, and we 

know there is a crisis out there and we have to move as quickly 

as we can to bring these ideas together and to begin to deal with 

this crisis. You have offered many good recommendations that we 

will certainly consider. I look forward to maybe pulling all of you 

together again to see where we are in a few months, and the reason for this is to see that we mean business and we want to try 

to deal with this problem that we are facing. 

So with that, thank you again so much. This hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 5:08 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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