CDC purge hits 600 workers in key offices despite reversals

About 600 Centers for Disease Control employees in offices dealing with health statistics, injury and violence prevention, congressional outreach and human resources are out of work as a result of the Trump administration's mass layoffs of agency workers late Friday, sources familiar said.Why it matters: While the administration has since rescinded more than half of the approximately 1,300 termination notices it sent, the upheaval from the layoffs that are still taking effect could undermine efforts to protect public health.They've also become a flashpoint in broader shutdown-related layoffs that are being challenged in court by federal worker unions. Driving the news: The cuts have hit offices including the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, the National Center for Health Statistics and the CDC's Washington office, which is the channel for communications with Congress, sources said.Also hit was the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, which supports Kennedy's "Make America Healthy Again" initiative, and an ethics office that reviews conflicts of interest, Debra Houry, who recently resigned as the agency's chief medical officer, told Axios.Two unions — American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees —condemned the firings late Sunday as an unlawful abuse of power.They also accused President Trump of using the civil service as a bargaining chip in the shutdown showdown.Between the lines: The CDC layoffs come on top of steep cuts Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ordered earlier this year, and after a gunman in August opened first on CDC headquarters in Atlanta in what health workers partly blame on Kennedy's inflammatory rhetoric and misinformation.The cuts to the CDC's injury center claimed 132 workers, including an operations team that administers grants to states and localities, a science team that also handled academic research awards and a policy team that handles all congressional requests, according to a source who was granted anonymity to reveal internal agency details.CDC units whose initial cuts were reversed over the weekend included the Epidemic Intelligence Service — a group known as the "disease detectives" that's on the front lines of public health responses and was spared from DOGE-directed cuts in February.The staff of the highly regarded Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report also saw terminations rescinded. The weekly journal is a prime source in health circles for public health information and recommendations.Senior agency officials whose firings were reversed include Athalia Christie, who was "incident commander" of the measles response, and senior infectious disease expert Maureen Bartee, per the New York Times.What they're saying: "The employees who received incorrect notifications were never separated from the agency and have all been notified that they are not subject to the reduction in force," an HHS spokesperson said on Sunday.An unidentified health official told ABC News the administration mistakenly issued reduction-in-force notices to members of key offices due to a "coding error.""I'm concerned that these cuts will impact CDCs day-to-day functioning and certainly this will compromise the agency's ability to protect the public," Houry told Axios."I'm also not sure what strategy was used to decide these cuts as many of these HR, communications, and policy are essential across the agency for all its programs."Others worried about the long-term impact. "We have a CDC that was already wounded, and now you're coming in again and making additional cuts there," Richard Besser, a former acting director of the CDC, told Axios. "There are so many things as a physician and as a public health practitioner where I look to the CDC for the best information, best guidance, and unfortunately, I'm not able to do that anymore," Besser said.What we're watching: The federal employee unions are asking the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to invalidate the firings, arguing that the White House budget office exceeded its statutory authority in ordering the shutdown firings.

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