Senate Confirms Treatment Expert as Deputy Director of ONDCP

As the Philadelphia Inquirer reported on August 8, 2009 ("Treatment Expert Confirmed for a Top Drug Post"), the Senate unanimously confirmed "University of Pennsylvania psychologyst A. Thomas McLellan as deputy director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy," or ONCDP for short. As the Inquirer explains, McLellan's confirmation "means that [he] will be the No. 2 to Gil Kerlikowske" and "will be charged with reducing the nation's demand for drugs."

Previously, McLellan worked as the executive director for the Treatment Research Institute, "a nonprofit he cofounded in Philadelphia 17 years ago to study and compare treatments and to translate scientific findings into clinical practice and public policy." According to the article, the 60-year-old's work places him among the country's "leading researcher[s] in addiction and treatment."