Aug. 2023 | Vol. 05 Iss. 08
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DR. ANGELA DUNN STILL SERVES THE PUBLIC, JUST NOT SO PUBLICALLY By Ella Joy Olsen | e.olsen@mycityjournals.com
H
er job is still to protect the public, but her role these days is a little more Clark Kent than Superman, and that’s just how she likes it. She’s Dr. Angela Dunn, former Utah State Epidemiologist, and the face many still associate with the Covid-19 pandemic. “Even now when I meet new people they’ll say something like, ‘I feel like I should get your autograph,’ and that’s always a little unsettling to me,” Dunn says, indicating that public servants don’t serve for celebrity status, either positive or negative. “Heck, I dyed my hair blonde so I wouldn’t be as recognizable, but the hair thing is too much work, so I’m going back to brunette.” Still, she feels a little bad about being associated with a public health crisis, with the years that were quite possibly some of the hardest ever encountered by our country, our state and the community-at-large. The role of State Epidemiologist is, by nature, an outwardly focused one. Dunn’s duty was to share directly with the public emerging and science-based suggestions for containing any public health crisis. She just happened to get a global pandemic. She, and other health officials
countrywide, worked against a political movement that belittled scientific expertise. This drew controversy from local detractors who circulated her address on social media and gathered in front of her home to protest. “It was scary and wrong that someone would feel comfortable sharing my personal information,” Dunn told the Salt Lake Tribune in late 2020. “That people would think it is OK to harass civil servants.” About that time she realized the controversy had diminished her ability to be perceived as a neutral figure, so in 2021 when the county’s executive health director, Gary Edwards, announced his retirement, and Dunn had the opportunity to move into a less visible role, she took off the cape, so to speak. Still a superhero She’s now two years into her position as the Executive and Medical Director of the Salt Continued page 4 Dr. Angela Dunn and her son represent the Salt Lake County Health Department at Pride. (Photo Angela Dunn)
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