CDC's 60th Anniversary: Director's Perspective --- David J.
Sencer, M.D., M.P.H., 1966--1977 Change, national and
international, was the engine that thrust CDC into its third
decade (1966--1975). Starting the decade as the Communicable
Disease Center, it ended the decade as the Center for Disease
Control as part of the Public Health Service (PHS) under the
U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) (Box).
By 1965, CDC had become a national resource in communicable
disease control, serving its primary constituency, state and
local health departments, through technical assistance, loan of
personnel, and grants in aid. By then, the Epidemic Intelligence
Service (EIS) was firmly entrenched as the nation's major source
of trained epidemiologists. CDC laboratories were recognized as
gold standards in microbiology, clinical chemistry, and
toxicology. Programs to assist states in the control of vaccine-
preventable diseases, sexually transmitted diseases, and
tuberculosis were functioning well. However, o