After the latest one Following a series of mass layoffs at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over the weekend, the union representing agency workers estimates that about 3,000 people have left the agency this year, or about a quarter of the agency’s workforce.
This number includes workers affected by layoffs earlier this year, as well as those who accepted the Trump administration’s “Fork in the Road” buyout program.
The latest cuts come amid the ongoing government shutdown. On October 10, more than 1,300 CDC employees received notice of termination. However, approximately 700 of these people were soon informed by e-mail that their contract had been terminated in error and that they were not, in fact, subject to power reductions. It is estimated that another 600 people are being laid off.
According to the union, an additional 1,300 CDC employees are on administrative leave and are paid but not working.
The Trump administration has not shared official numbers of people affected by the reductions. The estimates were compiled by the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), Local 2883, which represents CDC employees.
The current round of cuts applies to the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, the National Center for Health Statistics, the CDC library, the agency’s human resources department, campus security staff, and the CDC office in Washington, D.C., which serves as a liaison to Congress and provides policymakers with public health information.
“All HHS employees receiving retrenchment notices have been deemed nonessential by their departments,” Andrew Nixon, communications director at the Department of Health and Human Services, told WIRED by email.
According to AFGE, those reinstated include employees who produce the agency’s flagship publication, the weekly Morbidity and Mortality Report, as well as leadership of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases and the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases. Members of the Epidemic Intelligence Service, the CDC’s “disease detectives” unit, were also brought in.
Since HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took office in February. there is confusion at the CDC. In addition to mass layoffs, Kennedy is trying to upend established vaccine policy. Earlier this year, he removed all 17 sitting members of the federal vaccine advisory committee, replacing them with members of his own choosing. Some of them are skeptical about vaccines and critical of public health measures taken during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In August, Kennedy fired CDC Director Susan Monarez, who had served in the role for just a month. In September, Monarez told a Senate committee that Kennedy demanded she sign off on fresh vaccine recommendations “regardless of scientific evidence” and fired officials without cause. During her brief stay at the CDC, an attacker opened fire on the agency’s Atlanta campus and killed a police officer who responded to the shooting.