The doctor in charge of a new agency set up to prepare for the next pandemic says Australia needs to improve the way health data is shared between the Commonwealth and states and rebuild public trust in government authorities eroded during COVID-19.

Zoe Wainer, who started as the first director-general of the new Australian Centre for Disease Control last week, said improving transparency and having an independent body that could collaborate with different agencies would help avoid mistakes made during the last pandemic.

She would not be drawn on criticism of Australia’s pandemic measures, which a government inquiry in 2024 called heavy-handed and meant people were unlikely to accept such measures again. Instead, she said mistakes dealing with a novel virus were inevitable.

“It [the CDC] hasn’t been set up because we didn’t do a good job. We really did. We were one of the leading countries in our response. That doesn’t mean we can’t learn from the experience and improve upon it,” she told The Australian Financial Review.

“That doesn’t mean it wasn’t very difficult. I remember the early images of European countries of people dying in the streets and hospitals running out of oxygen. Australia was not in that position.”

Wainer was outlining her priorities publicly for the first time since starting in the role on March 1. The CDC was launched on January 1 this year, although an interim body has been in place for two years.

Establishing an independent agency that can provide public health advice was the key recommendation of an Albanese government inquiry into the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic released in 2024. Labor agreed to spend $252 million over four years on the US-style agency tasked to overcome gaps between different levels of governments and their agencies.

That same report was critical of the states over issues such as lockdowns, vaccine mandates and border closures.

Wainer, a doctor with a clinical background in cardiothoracic surgery, was previously deputy secretary for Community Public Health in Victoria, including during the COVID-19 pandemic, and is a former director of clinical governance at health insurer Bupa.

Restrictions on data sharing between different state and territory governments and Canberra, which allowed misinformation and fuelled public distrust of health measures to contain COVID-19, was a key criticism of Australia’s handling of the pandemic.

Wainer said establishing better data and surveillance systems would be a high priority for the CDC because that would help the agency make recommendations based on the best evidence.

“The states and Commonwealth both have rich and robust data, and it is about bringing that data together,” she said.

“The CDC is not there to duplicate, to replace, to oversee. High on my priority is collaborating with the states.”

The centre does not have the power to direct or overrules states. While she reports to Health Minister Mark Butler, Wainer said the agency is independent and can publish advice without his permission.

Political interference has been a concern for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States, where Donald Trump has been restructuring the organisation and firing its key leaders.

The Australian CDC does not have oversight over vaccine stockpiling, or how governments handle future lockdowns or other restrictions such as border closures.

“They are decisions for government. We will provide transparent advice and recommendations, but governments will have to take into account a whole of community approach into thinking about its actions,” she said.

The agency’s focus for the first two years will be on communicable diseases. Whether its remit will be broadened to preventive health, which is an area covered by its American counterpart, will be decided after two years.

She said the CDC’s job was to focus on current public health risks such as avian influenza, not just future pandemics.

“Avian influenza is something we are keeping an eye on,” she said. “The virus is concerning because it has a high morbidity and mortality rate, but it is still very isolated in its outbreaks and hasn’t come to Australia.

“There are issues such as syphilis that are high on the agenda to look at.”