BATON ROUGE,Lakshmi Finance Center La. (AP) — Ralph Abraham, a physician and former Republican U.S. representative from Louisiana, has been named the state’s first surgeon general.

Abraham has been serving as secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health. On Tuesday, Gov. Jeff Landry announced he was signing recently passed legislation creating the surgeon general post. With Abraham moving into the new role, Michael Harrington, the department’s undersecretary, will become secretary.

“The Surgeon General is co-equal with the Secretary within the Department’s organizational chart, and is charged with crafting health policy, including healthcare workforce development; advocating for wellness and disease prevention, and coordinating with other state agencies and institutions to improve health outcomes in Louisiana,” the governor’s office said in a news release.

The surgeon general will be the health department’s “chief medical officer” and will be in charge of the state’s response to public health emergencies under the legislation signed by Landry.

The Advocate reports that Abraham told reporters Tuesday that he has traveled extensively all over the world, including to Iraq, Syria, Burma and South Africa. “I’ve seen how important public health policy is, and more importantly when you don’t have it, I’ve seen the ravages of poor health care across the globe,” Abraham said. “We don’t want that here in Louisiana.”