Obama to announce new surgeon general

From Elaine Quijano
CNN
WASHINGTON (CNN) - President Barack Obama has tapped Dr. Regina Benjamin to serve as surgeon general, a White House official said Monday. The president is expected to announce his decision Monday morning.

The rural family physician has long provided medical care on the Gulf Coast. In 1990, she founded Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic in the fishing village of Bayou La Batre, Alabama.

The clinic was heavily damaged by Hurricanes Georges, in 1998, and Katrina, in 2005, but Benjamin rebuilt it each time and continued to offer medical care to the village's 2,500 residents.

Many of her family practice patients are uninsured, according to the MacArthur Foundation, which last year awarded her one of its $500,000 "genius" grants.

Her patient population includes immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, who make up a third of Bayou La Batre's population.