How CDC Cuts Endanger American Lives

By Candice Johnson

Since the Trump administration took office in January 2025, the workforce at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has weathered uncertainty and change.

Mass firings, communication freezes, political interference in the CDC’s scientific mission and a revolving door of leaders have created a challenging work environment for the CDC’s employees.

I’m a public health researcher who studies how working conditions affect employee health and well-being. I also worked at the CDC from 2012 to 2020. Given the turmoil imposed on the CDC workforce since Inauguration Day, I worked with a team of researchers at Michigan State University to conduct an anonymous survey of more than 600 CDC workers.

We found a CDC workforce concerned by a declining ability to achieve the agency’s public health mission, a shrinking and overworked staff and wide-ranging effects that threaten Americans’ health.

CDC’s mission is to protect and improve the health of Americans, which it fulfills by preventing, detecting and controlling disease. CDC also staffs a pool of public health experts who are rapidly deployed to respond to public health emergencies – including disease outbreaks – worldwide. The cuts to CDC put these functions in jeopardy.

Key CDC Posts Empty As Ebola Outbreak Grows

As an explosive Ebola virus outbreak takes hold in Central Africa, infectious disease experts are questioning the U.S. government’s ability to effectively respond to public health emergencies following the cuts to the CDC and foreign aid, as well as the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization.

The CDC remains without strong leadership at a critical point in the outbreak response.

In August 2025, Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired CDC Director Susan Monarez after she refused to accept political interference with the agency, causing multiple senior CDC leaders to resign in protest. Almost one year later, the CDC’s top leadership positions remain vacant. The agency has no director, principal deputy director, chief of staff or chief medical officer to lead employees through a complicated emergency response.

But in our survey, we were most interested in knowing how this administration’s changes have affected CDC’s rank-and-file workforce, who are on the front lines of protecting Americans’ health.

Emergency Response Eroded

Between February and April 2026, our team distributed our anonymous survey through employee and alumni groups, LinkedIn and professional networks. We received responses from 433 current and 191 former CDC employees who had left since January 2025; 95% were federal employees and the rest contractors or other nonfederal workers.

The survey questions asked how the second Trump administration’s changes have affected their day-to-day work.

In June, we presented our initial findings at the annual meeting of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists as we prepare for publication in an academic journal.

More than 99% of CDC employees we surveyed – 604 out of 605 – said that the administration’s changes to the CDC reduced its capacity to respond to a public health emergency.

For example, during the 2014–2016 Ebola virus outbreak, the CDC sent its public health professionals – including me – on more than 3,000 deployments to West Africa to control the outbreak. But today, in the midst of another growing Ebola outbreak, deep cuts to the CDC workforce mean that the agency may no longer have sufficient personnel to deploy at the same capacity if needed.

Americans are already seeing this in the CDC’s response to ongoing measles outbreaks in the U.S. Public health experts note that the CDC’s communication with the public about the outbreaks has been confusing and sparse, which they attribute to the cuts.

85% of CDC Workforce Burned Out

The CDC is home to a specialized public health workforce tasked with responding to the nation’s most important health problems.

Since January 2025, the CDC has lost just over a quarter of its federal employee workforce. More than 1,000 employees were fired after their positions were eliminated, with hundreds remaining on administrative leave due to a court order preventing their firing. Resignations, retirements and contract nonrenewals have further shrunk the workforce.

“We have the same amount of work,” wrote a CDC manager whose work unit was particularly hard-hit by staff losses, “but it is not possible to do all of it with half the staff.”

Among the current CDC workers we surveyed, 85% said they were burning out.

These cuts and challenges have made CDC employees pessimistic about the agency’s future. Of the current CDC employees we surveyed, 1 in 5 have decided to leave, further straining CDC’s resources. The vast majority who left voluntarily – 95% – told us they left mostly or entirely because of changes implemented by the current administration.

“The anti-vaccine, anti-science stance of this administration meant that I could no longer in good conscience continue to work there given the type of work that I did,” a former CDC manager explained.

Similar reasons were given by senior CDC leaders and scientists who resigned in protest since January 2025, citing budget cuts, scientific censorship and political interference with the CDC’s public health mission as the reasons they resigned.

The CDC’s nonscientific workforce was also hard-hit, with the Department of Health and Human Services eliminating CDC’s digital media teams, offices handling Equal Employment Opportunity complaints and Freedom of Information Act requests, and much of human resources and acquisitions. In our survey, 94% of CDC employees said that under this administration, it became harder to do their job.

Cuts to Chronic Disease and Injury Prevention

Although the CDC’s responses to infectious disease outbreaks like hantavirus or Ebola virus tend to dominate headlines, much of the agency’s day-to-day work focuses on chronic disease and injury prevention.

Chronic diseases are the No. 1 killer of Americans, and injuries are the No. 1 killer of American children.

Despite Kennedy’s assertions that his administration will focus on preventing chronic disease, he has quietly shuttered many of the CDC’s chronic disease and injury prevention programs, including those dedicated to improving women’s health, preventing violence and injuries, tracking infertility, reducing tobacco use and promoting healthy aging.

President Donald Trump’s fiscal year 2026 budget proposed eliminating the CDC’s chronic disease and injury prevention programs entirely. The final funding bill rejected these cuts.

We asked current and former CDC employees in chronic disease and injury prevention programs what happened to their work unit under this administration. Only three of 142, or 2%, said their work unit remains fully operational and able to meet its public health mission.

We asked everyone we surveyed if they thought Americans will die because of the administration’s changes to the agency; 95% said yes.

Public Health Cuts Ripple Through the Country

Many of the CDC’s functions are invisible to the general public, making it easy to hide the extent to which the agency has been damaged.

In addition to responding to public health emergencies and preventing disease, the CDC plays a vital role in sustaining the nation’s public health infrastructure. About 80% of the CDC’s domestic budget goes to fund public health programs run by state, territorial, tribal and local partners, directly protecting health in local communities.

Health departments around the country are now grappling with sudden cuts to the federal funding that sustains their health data collection and health promotion activities.

I believe that current and recent CDC employees have the best view of how the administration’s cuts are affecting the agency. Their observations warn of a U.S. government losing its ability to protect the nation’s health.

Candice Johnson, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at Michigan State University. Prior to academia, she was an epidemiologist at the CDC and a member of the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service.

This article originally appeared in The Conversation and is republished with permission.  

How Fear Can Make the Coronavirus Worse

By Dr. Lynn Webster, PNN Columnist

At 7:09 am on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, a 5.7 magnitude earthquake struck Salt Lake City, Utah — the city in which I live. Though it caused little damage, the earthquake created immense fear. 

This occurred during a week in which the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged, setting a record for the largest stock market drop in U.S. history. Although only about half of U.S. citizens own stocks, the impact of the enormous amount of wealth lost will have a ripple effect on every American. 

In addition, like the rest of world, we face the coronavirus pandemic. Because Salt Lakers have experienced a trifecta of calamities, our fear is palpable.

But intense fear is not limited to Salt Lake City. It is ubiquitous. People all around the world are experiencing nearly unprecedented levels of fear in the face of the pandemic. As a friend of mine said, it feels like an apocalypse of biblical proportions.

Fear is a primordial emotion that can protect humans from danger, but it can also be destructive.

Typically, fear is proportional to three factors: the magnitude of the threat; how well we can predict and control the potential harm; and whether we can see that the threat's end is in sight. Since we know so little about the novel coronavirus, all three factors contribute to our fear.

A 2016 paper published in the journal Disaster Health described Fear-Related Behaviors (FRBs) that occur during mass threats to a society. The study found that FRBs have four possible outcomes: they can increase harm, have no effect on harm, decrease harm, or prevent harm. Since we are all terrified, it may be helpful to know the consequences our fear may have.

What We Can Learn from the Ebola Outbreak

The 2013-2016 West Africa Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak may be the best and most recent example of how to predict the effects of FRBs on COVID-19. 

More than 28,600 people became ill from Ebola in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Given the virus’ high mortality rate of nearly 40 percent, it caused approximately 11,300 deaths.  

Examining the behaviors and outcomes of EVD may portend the outcome of the COVID-19 pandemic if the FRBs we exhibit with the novel coronavirus are proportionately similar to those caused by Ebola outbreak.

There were five overarching consequences of FRBs during the EVD crisis:  

1. Fear accelerated the transmission of Ebola. Those who lived in infected areas tried to escape by traveling to places they perceived as less infected. In effect, they tried to outrun the infection, but that proved impossible. They carried the disease with them, infecting Ebola-free communities and increasing the number of deaths. Ignoring the risk would have the same effect in the United States. 

2. Fear — in combination with lack of resources — discouraged some of those who were infected from seeking care for their disease. They may have died from EVD unnecessarily. Those who are underinsured or lack insurance in the United States may also decline to seek care. 

3. The fear of being exposed to EVD prevented some people with other life-threatening diseases from getting the health care they needed. That may happen now, too. People who have heart disease, diabetes, immuno-suppressed cancer, or chronic pain may not seek medical treatment because they fear being exposed to the coronavirus through contact with healthcare providers or other patients. 

4. Fear of EVD increased the number of people with mental health disorders. Fear-induced stress may have caused trauma and exacerbated existing mental health problems. Also, survivors involved in providing care to the ill were often blamed for spreading the disease. Some may have suffered from survivor's guilt. Depression and other mental health disorders were common in survivors.  

5. The belief that specific countries were responsible for the origin and spread of EVD led to widespread discrimination and ostracism. This, in turn, caused serious social and economic consequences. We see that scenario play out again whenever someone calls the coronavirus the “Chinese virus.” 

Fear Can Increase or Mitigate Harm 

On the other hand, fear can also mitigate harm. In the case of COVID-19, the prospect of what may happen if we do nothing is overwhelming. Therefore, our fear may motivate us to protect ourselves and our families by adhering to the advice of experts in such health organizations as CDC and WHO. That may save lives. 

Consider your own behavior in light of the five FRBs described above. Ask yourself: 

• Could any of your avoidance or panicked behaviors be accelerating the transmission of COVID-19? 

• If you have symptoms that suggest you may have the coronavirus, are you in denial rather than seeking medical care? 

• If you are coping with other medical conditions, are you avoiding the doctor's office, or are you pursuing the health care you need? 

• If you are feeling overwhelmed by the fear and stress inherent in this situation, are you seeking support or professional help? 

• Do you acknowledge, and help others understand, that China, as the unfortunate initial vector of COVID-19, bears no responsibility for it and does not deserve to be our scapegoat?

In such an interconnected world, our individual responses determine our collective experience. We must not let fear make the crisis worse. Fear can help protect us, but it can also be our enemy.

We don't need another enemy. The virus is enough of an adversary for us to deal with. We must avoid giving fear undue power over our actions and judgment at such a critical time. 

Lynn R. Webster, MD, is a vice president of scientific affairs for PRA Health Sciences and consults with the pharmaceutical industry. He is author of the award-winning book, “The Painful Truth,” and co-producer of the documentary, “It Hurts Until You Die.” You can find Lynn on Twitter: @LynnRWebsterMD.

Opinions expressed are those of the author alone and do not reflect the views or policy of PRA Health Sciences.