A devastating portrait of chaos and scientific collapse at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has emerged, with 43 current and former employees describing to The New York Times how Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has systematically dismantled the nation’s premier public health agency since taking office under President Donald Trump.
The accounts paint a picture of an agency in freefall, where decades of scientific protocols have been abandoned, expert staffers have fled in droves, and political ideology has replaced evidence-based medicine. The crisis intensified when President Trump fired CDC director Susan Monarez on August 27, 2025, triggering an immediate exodus of at least four top leaders who refused to participate in what former employees describe as the demolition of American public health infrastructure.
“When those who know the CDC best are the most alarmed about the state it’s in, it’s terrifying to think how ill-prepared RFK Jr. is for the next public health crisis,” said Kayla Hancock, Director of Protect Our Care’s Public Health Project.
The scale of Kennedy’s transformation has shocked even veteran observers. He removed all 17 members of the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee and replaced them with hand-selected appointees who share his vaccine-skeptic views. He canceled $500 million in federally funded mRNA vaccine research. He dismissed thousands of federal health employees and declared the end of U.S. support for international vaccination efforts that protect millions of children worldwide.
Nine former CDC directors and acting directors—whose tenures span from the Carter administration through Trump’s first term—published an unprecedented joint statement in The New York Times declaring that Kennedy’s leadership “is unlike anything we have ever seen at the agency, and unlike anything our country has ever experienced.” Among the signers were William Foege, William Roper, David Satcher, Jeffrey Koplan, Richard Besser, Tom Frieden, Anne Schuchat, Rochelle P. Walensky, and Mandy K. Cohen.
Former employees interviewed by the Times described an agency where scientific rigor has been replaced by what one called decision-making “based on vibes.” Daniel Jernigan, former director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, told the Times he had never seen an agency responsible for 340 million Americans be “so willy-nilly” in bypassing regulatory processes for policy changes.
The institutional carnage extends beyond personnel changes. Former communications specialist Aryn Melton Backus noted that the Office on Smoking and Health was eliminated entirely, despite expectations it would survive given Kennedy’s stated focus on chronic illness. Former medical epidemiologist Fiona Havers told the Times she left because she refused to be part of any machine used to spread false information about vaccines.
Perhaps most alarming to public health experts are reports that political appointees have taken control of the CDC’s communications, bypassing the rigorous scientific review process that previously governed all published information. Susan A. Wang, former senior medical adviser in the global immunization division, warned that the CDC website now mixes accurate and inaccurate information, making it impossible to trust—and potentially poisoning artificial intelligence algorithms that rely on CDC data.
The former directors said Kennedy halted funding for promising medical research, replaced experts on federal health advisory committees with unqualified people who share his dangerous, unscientific views, and announced an end to U.S. support for global vaccination programs while relying on flawed research and making inaccurate claims
Dr. Richard Besser, acting CDC director during the Obama administration and now president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, told ABC News that Kennedy entered his role with “a strong agenda that is centered on dismantling our vaccine system in America.”
Former chief medical officer Debra Houry, an emergency room physician, compared her final months at the agency to practicing medicine in a war zone. Former public health adviser Abby Tighe warned that the consequences will outlast the current administration, noting that the full outcomes won’t be visible until Trump is long gone.
The former directors called on Congress to exercise oversight authority over HHS and urged state and local governments to fill funding gaps. Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, has called for hearings and oversight following the leadership departures. The former directors concluded their statement by noting that CDC employees “deserve an H.H.S. secretary who stands up for health, supports science and has their back. So, too, does our country.”