Tag: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

C.D.C. Brings Back Hundreds of Suspended Workplace Safety Employees

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. placed about 90 percent of the roughly 1,000 employees of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health on administrative leave last April.

Published January 14, 2026

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: January 14, 2026
By Apoorva Mandavilli

The Trump administration reinstated on Tuesday hundreds of employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who had been placed on administrative leave in April.

The employees are all staff members of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, a C.D.C. unit charged with preventing work-related injuries.

“This moment belongs to every single person who refused to stay silent,” said Micah Niemeier-Walsh, an industrial hygienist at NIOSH and the vice president of an American Federation of Government Employees union local that represents C.D.C. employees.

Comments closed

vaccines

‘Incomprehensibly stupid:’ How U.S. cuts in vaccine recommendations will impact Canadians

Published January 11, 2026

Published by: CTV News
Published on: January 11, 2026
By Kamil Karamali

Canadian doctors are warning that a new U.S. policy which slashes the number of vaccines universally recommended to all children could have devastating, and potentially deadly effects in Canada, including increasing disease spread through American travellers visiting north of the border.

“This was just incomprehensibly stupid. I was horrified,” said family doctor and former president of the Ontario Medical Association, Dr. Sohail Gandhi in an interview with CTV News Saturday. “Children in the U.S. are going to die as a result of this move – and, worse, some children are going to have lifelong complications as a result of this move.”

Comments closed

pro-virus policies

Panel Votes to Stop Recommending Hepatitis B Shots at Birth for Most Newborns

In a move toward Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s goal of upending vaccine policy, the committee recommended delaying the shots for infants whose mothers test negative for the virus.

Published December 5, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: December 5, 2025
By Apoorva Mandavilli

A federal vaccine committee took a major step toward Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s goal of remaking the childhood vaccine schedule on Friday, voting to end a decades-long recommendation that all newborns be immunized at birth against hepatitis B, a highly infectious virus that can cause severe liver damage.

The divisiveness and dysfunction of the committee in making the decision, however, raised questions about the reliability of the advisory process and left at least one critic “very concerned about the future” of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The panel, called the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, voted 8 to 3 that women who test negative for hepatitis B should consult with their health care provider and decide “when or if” their child will be vaccinated against the virus at birth. The committee did not change the recommendation that newborns of mothers known to be infected or whose status is unknown be immunized. The shift is not expected to affect insurance coverage of the shots.

Comments closed

war on science

Chaos following mass firings, rehirings at CDC

Published October 13, 2025

Published by: CIDRAP
Published on: October 13, 2025
By Stephanie Soucheray

Late Friday night more than 1,000 employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) were sent an email saying they had been let go due to reduction-in-force (RIF) efforts at the end of the second week of the federal government shutdown.

Some, however, were mistakenly fired and were rehired the next day, according to sources close to the situation.

Comments closed

war on science

Trump Administration Is Bringing Back Scores of C.D.C. Experts Fired in Error

Friday’s layoffs swept up scientists involved in responding to disease outbreaks and running an influential journal. Officials said the mistaken dismissals were being rescinded.

Published October 11, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: October 11, 2025
By Apoorva Mandavilli, Sheryl Gay Stolberg

The Trump administration on Saturday raced to rescind layoffs of hundreds of scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who were mistakenly fired on Friday night in what appeared to be a substantial procedural lapse.

Among those wrongly dismissed were the top two leaders of the federal measles response team, those working to contain Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo, members of the Epidemic Intelligence Service, and the team that assembles the C.D.C.’s vaunted scientific journal, The Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

After The New York Times reported the dismissals, two federal health officials said on Saturday that many of those workers were being brought back. The officials spoke anonymously in order to disclose internal discussions.

Comments closed

war on science

Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials

Published October 11, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: October 11, 2025
By Sheryl Gay Stolberg

Dozens of employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — including “disease detectives,” high-ranking scientists and the entire Washington office — were notified late Friday that they were losing their jobs as part of the Trump administration’s latest round of federal layoffs.

It was unclear on Friday how many C.D.C. workers were affected. But it was the latest blow to an agency that has been wracked by mass resignations, a shooting at its Atlanta headquarters in August and the firing of its director under pressure from Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Layoff notices landed in the email inboxes of C.D.C. employees shortly before 9 p.m. Eastern time on Friday, notifying employees that their duties had been deemed unnecessary or “virtually identical” to those being performed elsewhere in the agency. Scientists, including leaders, in offices addressing respiratory diseases, chronic diseases, injury prevention and global health were among those affected.

Comments closed

anti-vaxxers

Viewpoint: Four tips for understanding this week’s ACIP meeting

Published September 15, 2025

Published by: CIDRAP
Published on: September 15, 2025
By Vaccine Integrity Project Staff and Advisers

The last meeting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) in June abandoned the use of its rigorous evidence-to-recommendation framework for making vaccine policy decisions, which structures decisions around key factors, including the balance of benefits and harms, the type or quality of evidence and health economic analyses, among other elements. The meeting also included new members making inaccurate statements about both vaccine safety and efficacy and included a presentation by a well-known anti-vaccine advocate that was filled with errors.

Now, the committee is set to include even more vaccine skeptics when it meets later this week, according to published reports, including multiple anti–COVID mRNA vaccine activists. (On Monday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) confirmed five new ACIP members.)

Comments closed

anti-vaxxers

Video | How Trump’s cuts to the CDC could threaten Canadians’ public health

Published September 13, 2025

Published by: CBC News
Published on: September 13, 2025

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has long been a global leader in disease tracking and evidence-based medical guidelines, but recent funding cuts and firings have caused many to wonder whether the institution is still a trusted source. CBC’s Nisha Patel breaks down how some of those changes could put Canadians at risk.

Comments closed

war on science

Kennedy Sought to Fire C.D.C. Director Over Vaccine Policy

Published August 28, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: August 28, 2025
By Sheryl Gay Stolberg, Apoorva Mandavilli, Christina Jewett

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. summoned Susan Monarez, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to his office in Washington earlier this week to deliver an ultimatum.

She needed to fire career agency officials and commit to backing his advisers if they recommended restricting access to proven vaccines — or risk being fired herself, according to people familiar with the events.

Dr. Monarez’s refusal to do so led to an extraordinary standoff on Thursday that paralyzed the nation’s health agency, which is still reeling from mass layoffs and a shooting this month that killed a police officer and terrified employees.

Comments closed

war on science

CDC director fired after she ‘refused to rubber-stamp’ Kennedy’s vaccine directives

Published August 28, 2025

Published by: CIDRAP
Published on: August 28, 2025
By Stephanie Soucheray

Susan Monarez, PhD, was fired late yesterday as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) after clashing with Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on vaccine policy.

The White House fired her after Monarez refused to resign, and the action kicked off a mass resignation wave of three of the CDC’s top officials: Debra Houry, MD, MPH, the CDC’s chief medical officer; Demetre Daskalakis, MD, MPH, head of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases; and Daniel Jernigan, MD, MPH, head of the CDC’s National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases. Earlier this week Jennifer Layden, MD, PhD, who led the Office of Public Health Data, also stepped down.

Comments closed

war on science

CDC official in resignation letter says HHS policies ‘do not reflect scientific reality’

Published August 28, 2025

Published by: The Hill
Published on: August 28, 2025
By Sarah Fortinsky

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official tasked with overseeing the nation’s vaccine policy resigned from his post Wednesday, shortly after the White House fired the agency’s director.

Demetre Daskalakis, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, cited his philosophical differences with Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. that “challenge my ability to continue in my current role at the agency and in the service of the health of the American people,” adding, “Enough is enough.”

“I am unable to serve in an environment that treats CDC as a tool to generate policies and materials that do not reflect scientific reality and are designed to hurt rather than to improve the public’s health,” he wrote in his resignation letter, which he also posted on social media.

Comments closed

war on science

ACIP member critical of COVID vaccines to lead review

Published August 25, 2025

Published by: CIDRAP
Published on: August 25, 2025
By Lisa Schnirring

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) vaccine advisory group has long had a work group in place to review the latest COVID-19 vaccine science, including weighing the risks and benefits, but a newly constituted group will launch a sweeping new review of the vaccines led by a member who has opposed COVID vaccines.

The Brownstone Institute on August 22 reported that Retsef Levi, PhD, one of seven members appointed to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) by US Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has been appointed to lead the COVID vaccine review. On August 20, the CDC posted updated terms of reference for the COVID vaccine work group, which is lengthy. Some of the topics include impacts from repeated boosting and mapping policies in other countries.

Levi does not have a biomedical degree or clinical medicine experience. He has a doctorate in operations research and is a professor of operations management at MIT Sloan School of Management. On social media, Levi has called mRNA vaccines dangerous and said they should be removed from the market.

Comments closed

vaccines

Childhood vaccines were a global success story. Misinformation and other obstacles are slowing that progress, a study shows

Published June 25, 2025

Published by: CNN
Published on: June 25, 2025
By Jen Christensen

Routine vaccines have prevented the deaths of about 154 million children around the world over the past 50 years, a new study shows, but efforts have been slowing recently, allowing for the growth of some vaccine-preventable diseases. This backslide could lead to many more unnecessary illnesses and deaths without an increased effort to vaccinate children and counter misinformation.

The report, published Tuesday in the medical journal The Lancet, says that over the past five decades, the World Health Organization’s Expanded Programme on Immunization has vaccinated more than 4 billion children. This doubling of global coverage of vaccines has prevented countless cases of tuberculosis, measles, polio, diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis.

Comments closed

kakistocracy

‘I Think He Is About to Destroy Vaccines in This Country’

Published June 18, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: June 18, 2025
By David Wallace-Wells

I think we are on the verge of losing vaccines for this country, from this country. And the reason is that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will hold up a paper, in the next four or five months, that says it’s aluminum in vaccines that are causing a whole swath of problems, including autism. I think he is about to destroy vaccines in this country. I do.

— Paul Offit

Comments closed

vaccines

How Kennedy’s Purge of Advisers Could Disrupt U.S. Vaccinations

Published June 13, 2025

Published by: The New York Times
Published on: June 13, 2025
By Apoorva Mandavilli

With two extraordinary moves, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has upended the certainty that American children will always have cost-free access to lifesaving vaccines.

For decades, a little-known scientific panel at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended which shots Americans should get and when. The group’s endorsement means insurance companies must cover the costs and helps states decide which vaccines to mandate for school-age children.

The panel, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, also determines which shots are provided for free through the Vaccines for Children program, which serves about half of the children in the United States.

On Monday, Mr. Kennedy, long a vaccine skeptic, fired all 17 members of A.C.I.P., claiming that the group was rife with conflicts of interest and that a clean sweep was needed to restore public trust. Mr. Kennedy also reassigned C.D.C. staff scientists who oversee the panel’s work and vet its members.

Comments closed

vaccines

RFK Jr. names new members of CDC’s vaccine advisory panel

Published June 11, 2025

Published by: STAT
Published on: June 11, 2025
By Chelsea Cirruzzo, Isabella Cueto, Andrew Joseph, Helen Branswell

WASHINGTON — Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Wednesday unveiled the names of the eight new members who will sit on the panel of experts that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccine policy, and said they would review the current vaccine schedule, as well as evaluate new shots.

The new members include several well-known critics of vaccines.

“The slate includes highly credentialed scientists, leading public-health experts, and some of America’s most accomplished physicians,” Kennedy wrote in a post on X.

The appointment comes just days after Kennedy dismissed every member of the committee, calling for a “clean slate” with new members. The committee is scheduled to hold a meeting later this month.

Comments closed

vaccines

Exclusive: CDC expert resigns from COVID vaccines advisory role, sources say

Published June 3, 2025

Published by: Reuters
Published on: June 3, 2025
By Julie Steenhuysen, Michael Erman, Dan Levine

Pediatric infectious disease expert Dr. Lakshmi Panagiotakopoulos of the U.S. CDC resigned on Tuesday as co-leader of a working group that advises outside experts on COVID-19 vaccines and is leaving the agency, two sources familiar with the move told Reuters.

Panagiotakopoulos said in an email to work group colleagues that her decision to step down was based on the belief she is “no longer able to help the most vulnerable members” of the U.S. population.

In her role at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s working group of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, she co-led the gathering of information on topics for presentation.

Her resignation comes one week after Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a long-time vaccine skeptic who oversees the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health, said the COVID vaccine for healthy children and healthy pregnant women had been removed from the CDC’s recommended immunization schedule.

Comments closed

Trump regime

Watch Out. The Plague Years Start Now

Published February 19, 2025

Published by: The Tyee
Published on: February 19, 2025
By Crawford Kilian

Since the inauguration of Donald Trump on Jan. 20, the greatest health sciences organizations in the world have been first silenced, then frozen or outright destroyed. The scale, speed and stupidity of the destruction have been breathtaking.

The Trump regime is doing this to its own people, especially those in states that voted for Trump, but the shock is being felt around the world.

It is a safe prediction that Trump’s attack on health science will result in the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives. And millions of lives will be diminished.

Comments closed

Tag: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. placed about 90 percent of the roughly 1,000 employees of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health on administrative leave last April.

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

In a move toward Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s goal of upending vaccine policy, the committee recommended delaying the shots for infants whose mothers test negative for the virus.

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Friday’s layoffs swept up scientists involved in responding to disease outbreaks and running an influential journal. Officials said the mistaken dismissals were being rescinded.

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts

Still COVIDing Canada Posts