New Hampshire Health and Human Services Commissioner Lori Shibinette, who spent much of her two-and-a-half-year tenure responding to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, is planning to step down later this year.
Shibinette submitted her plans to resign at Tuesday’s Executive Council meeting. She said she will remain in her post through December.
In a statement provided to NHPR, the commissioner wrote that the decision to leave was difficult, but she “decided to take a short break from my work life to focus on both myself and my family.”
“The last three years have been incredibly challenging yet equally rewarding,” Shibinette said.
Nominated by Gov. Chris Sununu in late 2019, Shibinette assumed the role of commissioner in January 2020. She previously served as the CEO of New Hampshire Hospital, a deputy health commissioner and CEO of the Merrimack County Nursing Home. She is also a registered nurse, with experience working on the New Hampshire Hospital campus.
As New Hampshire’s top health official, Shibinette is responsible for leading the state’s most sprawling public agency — responsible for overseeing Medicaid and other public benefits, child protection programs, services for people with disabilities and more.
But much of Shibinette’s tenure was spent steering the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In that role, she oversaw the state’s early efforts to contain the virus — in the community and institutional settings, like long-term care facilities — and later supervised the rollout of more widespread testing, vaccinations and more.
Shibinette also oversaw the distribution of millions of dollars in federal pandemic aid. While the vast majority of that funding went to temporary programs, like staffing state-managed COVID-19 testing sites, Shibinette helped direct some of that money to more long-term initiatives, like improving the state’s fledgling vaccine registry system.
As commissioner, Shibinette often appeared before the state’s executive council and the legislative fiscal committee to defend policy decisions, appeal for funding and, at times, to push back against misinformation from lawmakers.
In one tense exchange during a legislative committee hearing last fall, Shibinette debunked falsehoods coming from then-House Finance Committee Chairman Ken Weyler about the COVID-19 vaccine.
“That is the problem that we are having, increasing our vaccination rate, is spreading misinformation about the COVID vaccine,” Shibinette told Weyler.
Shibinette was also one of the most public faces of New Hampshire’s pandemic response, appearing next to Gov. Chris Sununu on televised press conferences and in ads for the state’s vaccination campaign.
The commissioner also played a prominent role in the state’s acquisition of Hampstead Hospital, saying she hoped it would improve psychiatric care for children. New Hampshire has long struggled to meet the demand for emergency psychiatric care for both adults and kids.
As Shibinette prepares to depart later this year, DHHS continues to grapple with a number of challenges: ongoing, albeit scaled back, management of the COVID pandemic; preparation for a potential uptick in monkeypox cases; changes to public benefits tied to the end of the federal public health emergency and more.
New Hampshire also continues to deal with challenges related to substance misuse, as state officials report a recent uptick in overdoses. This will likely be among the long list of priorities for Shibinette’s successor, along with bolstering the state’s mental health system, addressing ongoing concerns about child protective services and workforce issues.
An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the date of the executive council meeting where Shibinette shared her plans.
