Hundreds of federal health workers, including doctors in senior leadership positions, began hearing they were losing their jobs early Tuesday morning. They are part of a huge restructuring that is responsible for food and drug regulation, protecting Americans from illness, and astonishing agencies accused of studying new treatments and treatments.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced last week that the department was shrinking with 10,000 employees. Some senior leaders based in Washington, D.C. have been notified that they have been reassigned to India's health services regions. This is a tactic to force people as it involves moving to other parts of the country.
Combined with previous departures, the layoff reduces the department from 82,000 to 62,000 employees. The department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
According to workers, notifications begin to arrive at 5am, affecting offices responsible for everything from health to medical devices to communications around the world. Some knew that the layoffs were coming. At Washington's department headquarters, employees reportedly had the exclusion of minority health and infectious disease prevention officers on Friday.
Others were caught off guard. The Food and Drug Administration has ousted senior leaders, and the office focused on food, drug and medical device policies has suffered a deep staff cut that spans around 3,500 agency staff. Some workers said they discovered they were fired early Tuesday when they tried to scan a badge to enter the building.
Top tobacco regulator Brian King has been offered jobs at the regional offices of Indian Health Services, including Alaska. Other staff have been let go of overseeing veterinary medicine and coordinating complex tasks reviewing new drug applications that can run on thousands of pages.
Some leaders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including Kela Laserson, who heads the Center for Global Health, have either reassigned similar notices or placed on administrative leave. At the agency, the restructuring, which totaled 2,400 cuts, appeared to be aimed at narrowing the focus on infectious diseases. The entire sector studying chronic diseases and environmental issues has been cut.
Employees fired at the agency include those studying injuries, asthma, lead poisoning, smoking, radiation injuries, and those who assess the health effects of extreme heat and wildfires.
However, several infectious disease teams were also fired. Like a group of global health researchers working to prevent the transmission of HIV to children, the group focused on improving vaccine access between underserved communities has been reduced
HIV prevention was an overall major goal. Jonathan Melmin, director of the HIV and Sexually Transmitted Diseases Center, was placed on administrative leave. The Trump administration had moved the CDC HIV preventive divisions to another agency within the health department. However, on Tuesday, the team leading HIV surveillance and research within the department was fired. It was unclear whether some of these features would be reproduced elsewhere.
The National Institutes of Health has been given notice of reallocation to India's health services districts and was told on Wednesday that they will need to report whether they will accept the move.
Among them was Dr. Jeanne Marazzo. He took over Dr. Anthony S. Fauko as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Shannon Senk, who heads the National Institute of Nursing.
Communications offices have been particularly violently attacked, including NIH, CDC, FDA Renate Myles, the communications directors of the National Institutes of Health, and NIH, CDC, FDA Renate Myles. Having promised “radical transparency,” Kennedy said he wants to integrate communication within his scope.
“We are focusing communications across the department to ensure a more coordinated and effective response to public health challenges, and ultimately benefiting American taxpayers,” Emily Hilliard, the department's assistant press chairman, said in an email Friday.
