Mike Pence was criticized for his handling of Indiana’s HIV outbreak. He will lead the U.S. coronavirus response.

When President Trump announced that Vice President Pence would lead federal efforts against the spread of the coronavirus, he said Pence was the right person for the task because of his experience.

The announcement has cast light on Pence’s record as a lawmaker and his handling of a major public health crisis during his time as governor of Indiana. The worst HIV outbreak in the state’s history happened on his watch in 2015, which critics blamed on Pence’s belated response and his opposition to authorizing a needle-exchange program.

In 2011, as a member of Congress, he voted to cut funding for Planned Parenthood. Two years later, a Planned Parenthood clinic that had been the only HIV-testing center in Scott County, Ind., closed after public health spending cuts, HuffPost reported.

“I don’t believe effective anti-drug policy involves handing out drug paraphernalia,” he told the Indianapolis Star at the time. Despite assurances from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that it is an effective way to halt the spread of infections and diseases such as HIV and hepatitis B and C, Pence said if state lawmakers tried to send him a bill for a needle-exchange program, he would veto it.

After 75 people were confirmed to be HIV-positive, Pence announced he would allow a 30-day needle exchange.

Public health officials weren’t the only ones to warn Pence about delaying action. State Rep. Ed Clere, a fellow Republican, also pushed Pence to approve a needle exchange.

“It was disappointing that it took so much effort to bring the governor on board,” Clere told the New York Times.

“Our findings suggest that with earlier action the actual number of infections recorded in Scott County — 215 — might have been brought down to fewer than 56, if the state had acted in 2013, or to fewer than 10 infections, if they had responded to the [hepatitis C] outbreak in 2010-2011,” the paper’s senior author, Forrest W. Crawford, said in a statement at the time. Instead they cut funding for the last HIV testing provider in the county.”

One of the researchers on the study, Yale epidemiologist Gregg Gonsalves, tweeted Wednesday that Pence’s assignment overseeing coronavirus efforts “speaks to a lack of seriousness by the White House.”

On Wednesday, Trump emphasized Pence would not be a coronavirus “czar” because “he is a part of the administration.”

Pence said he looked forward to leading the federal response to the coronavirus.

“As a former governor from the state where the first MERS case emerged in 2014,” he said, “I know full well the importance of presidential leadership, the importance of administration leadership, and the vital role of partnerships of state and local governments, and health authorities in responding to potential threats and dangerous infectious diseases.”