 Logo of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention | |
| Agency overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | July 1, 1946 |
| Preceding agencies |
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| Jurisdiction | Federal Government of the United States |
| Headquarters | Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. 33°47′58″N84°19′42″W / 33.79944°N 84.32833°W /33.79944; -84.32833 |
| Employees | 11,814  [1] |
| Annual budget | US$11.581 billion (FY24) |
| Agency executives |
|
| Parent agency | United States Department of Health and Human Services |
| Website | www |
TheCenters for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is thenational public health agency of the United States. It is aUnited States federal agency under theDepartment of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered inAtlanta, Georgia.[2][3]
The agency's main goal is the protection ofpublic health and safety through the control and prevention of disease, injury, anddisability in the US and worldwide.[4] The CDC focuses national attention on developing and applying disease control and prevention. It especially focuses its attention oninfectious disease,food borne pathogens,environmental health,occupational safety and health,health promotion,injury prevention, and educational activities designed to improve the health ofUnited States citizens. The CDC also conducts research and provides information onnon-infectious diseases, such asobesity anddiabetes, and is a founding member of theInternational Association of National Public Health Institutes.[5]
The CDC's current acting director isSusan Monarez who assumed the role on January 23, 2025.[6]
TheCommunicable Disease Center was founded July 1, 1946, as the successor to theWorld War IIMalaria Control in War Areas program[7] of the Office of National Defense Malaria Control Activities.[8]
Preceding its founding, organizations with global influence inmalaria control were the Malaria Commission of theLeague of Nations and theRockefeller Foundation.[9] The Rockefeller Foundation greatly supported malaria control,[9] sought to have the governments take over some of its efforts, and collaborated with the agency.[10]
The new agency was a branch of theU.S. Public Health Service and Atlanta was chosen as the location becausemalaria was endemic in the Southern United States.[11] The agency changed names (see infobox on top) before adopting the nameCommunicable Disease Center in 1946. Offices were located on the sixth floor of the Volunteer Building on Peachtree Street.[12]
With a budget at the time of about $1 million, 59 percent of its personnel were engaged inmosquito abatement and habitat control with the objective of control and eradication of malaria in the United States[13] (seeNational Malaria Eradication Program).
Among its 369 employees, the main jobs at CDC were originallyentomology and engineering. In CDC's initial years, more than six and a half million homes were sprayed, mostly withDDT. In 1946, there were only seven medical officers on duty and an early organization chart was drawn. UnderJoseph Walter Mountin, the CDC continued to be an advocate for public health issues and pushed to extend its responsibilities to many othercommunicable diseases.[14]
In 1947, the CDC made a token payment of $10 toEmory University for 15 acres (61,000 m2) of land on Clifton Road in DeKalb County, still the home of CDC headquarters as of 2019. CDC employees collected the money to make the purchase. The benefactor behind the "gift" wasRobert W. Woodruff,chairman of the board of theCoca-Cola Company. Woodruff had a long-time interest inmalaria control, which had been a problem in areas where he went hunting. The same year, the PHS transferred its San Francisco based plague laboratory into the CDC as the Epidemiology Division, and a new Veterinary Diseases Division was established.[7]
In 1951, Chief EpidemiologistAlexander Langmuir's warnings of potentialbiological warfare during theKorean War spurred the creation of theEpidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) as a two-year postgraduate training program in epidemiology. The success of the EIS program led to the launch ofField Epidemiology Training Programs (FETP) in 1980, training more than 18,000 disease detectives in over 80 countries.[15] In 2020, FETP celebrated the 40th anniversary of the CDC's support for Thailand's Field Epidemiology Training Program. Thailand was the first FETP site created outside of North America and is found in numerous countries, reflecting CDC's influence in promoting this model internationally.[16] The Training Programs in Epidemiology and Public Health Interventions Network (TEPHINET) has graduated 950 students.[17]
The mission of the CDC expanded beyond its original focus on malaria to includesexually transmitted diseases when the Venereal Disease Division of the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) was transferred to the CDC in 1957. Shortly thereafter, Tuberculosis Control was transferred (in 1960) to the CDC from PHS, and then in 1963 the Immunization program was established.[18]
It became theNational Communicable Disease Center effective July 1, 1967, and theCenter for Disease Control on June 24, 1970. At the end of thePublic Health Service reorganizations of 1966–1973, it was promoted to being a principal operating agency of PHS.[8]
It was renamed to the pluralCenters for Disease Control effective October 14, 1980,[8] as the modern organization of having multiple constituent centers was established. By 1990, it had four centers formed in the 1980s: the Center for Infectious Diseases, Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, the Center for Environmental Health and Injury Control, and the Center for Prevention Services; as well as two centers that had been absorbed by CDC from outside: theNational Institute for Occupational Safety and Health in 1973, and theNational Center for Health Statistics in 1987.[19]
An act of theUnited States Congress appended the words "and Prevention" to the name effective October 27, 1992. However, Congress directed that the initialism CDC be retained because of its name recognition.[20] Since the 1990s, the CDC focus has broadened to includechronic diseases,disabilities, injury control,workplace hazards,environmental health threats, and terrorism preparedness. CDC combats emerging diseases and other health risks, includingbirth defects,West Nile virus,obesity,avian,swine, andpandemic flu,E. coli, andbioterrorism, to name a few. The organization would also prove to be an important factor in preventing the abuse ofpenicillin. In May 1994 the CDC admitted having sent samples of communicable diseases to the Iraqi government from 1984 through 1989 which were subsequently repurposed for biological warfare, includingBotulinum toxin,West Nile virus,Yersinia pestis andDengue fever virus.[21]
On April 21, 2005, then–CDC directorJulie Gerberding formally announced the reorganization of CDC to "confront the challenges of 21st-century health threats".[22] She established four coordinating centers. In 2009 theObama administration re-evaluated this change and ordered them cut as an unnecessary management layer.[23]
As of 2013, the CDC'sBiosafety Level 4 laboratories were among the few that exist in the world.[24] They included one of only two official repositories ofsmallpox in the world, with the other one located at theState Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology VECTOR in the Russian Federation. In 2014, the CDC revealed they had discovered several misplaced smallpox samples while their lab workers were "potentially infected" withanthrax.[25]
The city of Atlanta annexed the property of the CDC headquarters effective January 1, 2018, as a part of the city's largest annexation within a period of 65 years; theAtlanta City Council had voted to do so the prior December.[3] The CDC andEmory University had requested that the Atlanta city government annex the area, paving the way for aMARTA expansion through the Emory campus, funded by city tax dollars.[26] The headquarters were located in anunincorporated area,[27] statistically in theDruid Hillscensus-designated place.[28]
On August 17, 2022, Dr. Walensky said the CDC would make drastic changes in the wake of mistakes during the COVID-19 pandemic. She outlined an overhaul of how the CDC would analyze and share data and how they would communicate information to the general public. In her statement to all CDC employees, she said: "For 75 years, CDC and public health have been preparing for COVID-19, and in our big moment, our performance did not reliably meet expectations."[29] Based on the findings of an internal report, Walensky concluded that "The CDC must refocus itself on public health needs, respond much faster to emergencies and outbreaks of disease, and provide information in a way that ordinary people and state and local health authorities can understand and put to use" (as summarized by the New York Times).[30]
In January 2025 it was reported that a CDC official had ordered all CDC staff to stop working with theWorld Health Organization.[31] Around January 31, 2025, several CDC websites, pages, and datasets related to HIV and STI prevention, LGBT and youth healthbecame unavailable for viewing after the agency was ordered to comply with Donald Trump's executive order to remove all material of "diversity, equity, and inclusion" and "gender identity".[32][33] Shortly thereafter, the CDC ordered its scientists to retract or pause the publication of all research which had been submitted or accepted for publication, but not yet published, which included any of the following banned terms: "Gender, transgender, pregnant person, pregnant people, LGBT, transsexual, non-binary, nonbinary, assigned male at birth, assigned female at birth, biologically male, biologically female”.[34]
In January 2025, due to a pause in communications imposed by the second Trump administration at federal health agencies, publication of theMorbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) was halted, the first time that had happened since its inception in 1960. The president of theInfectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) called the pause in publication a "disaster." Attempts to halt publication had been made by the first Trump administration after MMWR published information about COVID-19 that "conflicted with messaging from the White House." The pause in communications also caused the cancellation of a meeting between the CDC and IDSA about threats to public health regarding theH5N1 influenza virus.[35]
On February 14, 2025, around 1,300 CDC employees were laid off by the administration, which included all first-year officers of theEpidemic Intelligence Service.[36] The cuts also terminated 16 of the 24 Laboratory Leadership Service program fellows, an program designed for early career lab scientist to address laboratory testing shortcomings of the CDC.[37] In the following month, the Trump administration quietly withdrew its CDC director nominee,Dave Weldon, just minutes before his scheduled Senate confirmation hearing on March 13.[38]
The CDC is organized into centers, institutes, and offices (CIOs), with each organizational unit implementing the agency's activities in a particular area of expertise while also providing intra-agency support and resource-sharing for cross-cutting issues and specific health threats.[7]
As of the most recent reorganization in February 2023, the CIOs are:[39]
The Office of Public Health Preparedness was created during the 2001 anthrax attacks shortly after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Its purpose was to coordinate among the government the response to a range of biological terrorism threats.[41]
Most CDC centers are located inAtlanta. Building 18, which opened in 2005 at the CDC's main Roybal campus (named in honor of the late RepresentativeEdward R. Roybal), contains the premierBSL4 laboratory in the United States.[42][43][44]
A few of the centers are based in or operate other domestic locations:[45]
In addition, CDC operates quarantine facilities in 20 cities in the U.S.[46]
The CDC budget for fiscal year 2024 is $11.581 billion.[47]
As of 2021,[update] CDC staff numbered approximately 15,000 personnel (including 6,000 contractors and 840United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps officers) in 170 occupations. Eighty percent held bachelor's degrees or higher; almost half had advanced degrees (a master's degree or a doctorate such as a PhD,D.O., orM.D.).[48]
Common CDC job titles include engineer,entomologist,epidemiologist, biologist, physician,veterinarian,behavioral scientist,nurse,medical technologist, economist, public health advisor, health communicator,toxicologist, chemist,computer scientist, and statistician.[49] The CDC also operates a number of notable training and fellowship programs, including those indicated below.
TheEpidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) is composed of "boots-on-the-ground disease detectives" who investigate public health problems domestically and globally.[50] When called upon by a governmental body, EIS officers may embark on short-term epidemiological assistance assignments, or "Epi-Aids", to provide technical expertise in containing and investigating disease outbreaks.[51][52][53] The EIS program is a model for the internationalField Epidemiology Training Program.
The CDC also operates the Public Health Associate Program (PHAP), a two-year paid fellowship for recent college graduates to work in public health agencies all over the United States. PHAP was founded in 2007 and currently[when?] has 159 associates in 34 states.[54]
The Director of CDC is a position that currentlyrequires Senate confirmation. The director serves at the pleasure of the President and may be fired at any time. The CDC Director concurrently serves as the Administrator of theAgency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.[55]
Prior to January 20, 2025, it was aSenior Executive Service position[56] that could be filled either by a career employee, or as apolitical appointment that does notrequire Senate confirmation, with the latter method typically being used.[19][57][58] The change to requiring Senate confirmation was due to a provision in theConsolidated Appropriations Act, 2023.[59]
Twenty directors have[when?] served the CDC or its predecessor agencies, including three who have served during the Trump administration (including Anne Schuchat who twice served as acting director)[8][60] and three who have served during the Carter administration (including one acting director not shown here).[61] Two served under Bill Clinton, but only one under the Nixon to Ford terms.
| No. | Portrait | Director | Term of office | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  | Louis L. Williams Jr. | 1942–1943 | |
| 2 |  | Mark D. Hollis | 1944–1946 | |
| 3 |  | Raymond A. Vonderlehr | 1947–1951 | |
| 4 |  | Justin M. Andrews | 1952–1953 | |
| 5 |  | Theodore J. Bauer | 1953–1956 | |
| 6 |  | Robert J. Anderson | October 1, 1956 – June 30, 1960 | |
| 7 |  | Clarence A. Smith | 1960–1962 | |
| 8 |  | James L. Goddard | 1962–January 1966 | |
| 9 |  | David J. Sencer | 1966–May 1977 | |
| 10 |  | William H. Foege | May 1977 – 1983 | |
| 11 |  | James O. Mason | 1983–1989 | |
| 12 |  | William L. Roper | March 1, 1990 – June 30, 1993 | |
| 13 |  | David Satcher | November 15, 1993 – February 13, 1998 | [62] |
| 14 |  | Jeffrey P. Koplan | October 5, 1998 – March 31, 2002 | [63][64][65] |
| – |  | David Fleming (acting) | April 1, 2002 – June 2, 2002 | [66] |
| 15 |  | Julie Gerberding | June 3, 2002 – January 19, 2009 | [67][68] |
| – | | William Gimson (interim) | January 20, 2009 – January 21, 2009 | [69] |
| – |  | Richard Besser (acting) | January 22, 2009 – June 7, 2009 | [70] |
| 16 |  | Thomas R. Frieden | June 8, 2009 – January 19, 2017 | [57][71] |
| – |  | Anne Schuchat (acting) | January 20, 2017 – July 6, 2017 | [72] |
| 17 |  | Brenda Fitzgerald | July 7, 2017 – January 31, 2018 | [73] |
| – | | Anne Schuchat (acting) | February 1, 2018 – March 25, 2018 | [74] |
| 18 |  | Robert R. Redfield | March 26, 2018 – January 19, 2021 | [75][76] |
| 19 | .jpg) | Rochelle Walensky | January 20, 2021 – June 30, 2023 | [77][78] |
| – |  | Nirav D. Shah (acting) | July 1, 2023 – July 9, 2023 | [79] |
| 20 |  | Mandy Cohen | July 10, 2023 – January 20, 2025 | [80] |
| – | .png) | Susan Monarez (acting) | January 23, 2025–present | [81][82] |
Past Directors[83]
The CDC's programs address more than 400 diseases, health threats, and conditions that are major causes of death, disease, and disability. The CDC's website has information on various infectious (and noninfectious) diseases, includingsmallpox,measles, and others.
The CDC targets the transmission ofinfluenza, including theH1N1 swine flu, and launched websites to educate people about hygiene.[92]
Within the division are two programs: the Federal Select Agent Program (FSAP) and the Import Permit Program. The FSAP is run jointly with an office within the U.S. Department of Agriculture, regulating agents that can cause disease in humans, animals, and plants. The Import Permit Program regulates the importation of "infectious biological materials."[93]
The CDC runs a program that protects the public from rare and dangerous substances such asanthrax and theEbola virus. The program, called the FederalSelect Agent Program, calls for inspections of labs in the U.S. that work with dangerous pathogens.[94]
During the2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the CDC helped coordinate the return of two infected American aid workers for treatment atEmory University Hospital, the home of a special unit to handle highly infectious diseases.[95]
As a response to the 2014 Ebola outbreak, Congress passed a Continuing Appropriations Resolution allocating $30,000,000 towards CDC's efforts to fight the virus.[96]
The CDC also works on non-communicable diseases, including chronic diseases caused byobesity, physical inactivity and tobacco-use.[97] The work of the Division for Cancer Prevention and Control, led from 2010 byLisa C. Richardson, is also within this remit.[98][99]
The CDC implemented theirNational Action Plan for Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria as a measure against the spread ofantibiotic resistance in the United States. This initiative has a budget of $161 million and includes the development of theAntibiotic Resistance Lab Network.[100]
Globally, the CDC works with other organizations to address global health challenges and contain disease threats at their source. They work with many international organizations such as theWorld Health Organization (WHO) as well as ministries of health and other groups on the front lines of outbreaks. The agency maintains staff in more than 60 countries, including some from the U.S. but more from the countries in which they operate.[101] The agency's global divisions include the Division of Global HIV and TB (DGHT), the Division of Parasitic Diseases and Malaria (DPDM), the Division of Global Health Protection (DGHP), and the Global Immunization Division (GID).[102]
The CDC has been working with the WHO to implement theInternational Health Regulations (IHR), an agreement between 196 countries to prevent, control, and report on the international spread of disease, through initiatives including the Global Disease Detection Program (GDD).[103]
The CDC has also been involved in implementing the U.S. global health initiativesPresident's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) andPresident's Malaria Initiative.[104]
The CDC collects and publishes health information for travelers in a comprehensive book,CDC Health Information for International Travel, which is commonly known as the "yellow book."[105] The book is available online and in print as a new edition every other year and includes current travel health guidelines, vaccine recommendations, and information on specifictravel destinations. The CDC also issues travel health notices on its website, consisting of three levels:
The CDC uses a number of tools to monitor the safety of vaccines. TheVaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), a national vaccine safety surveillance program run by CDC and the FDA. "VAERS detects possible safety issues with U.S. vaccines by collecting information about adverse events (possible side effects or health problems) after vaccination."[107] The CDC's Safety Information by Vaccine page provides a list of the latest safety information, side effects, and answers to common questions about CDC recommended vaccines.[108]
TheVaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) works with a network of healthcare organizations to share data on vaccine safety and adverse events.[109] The Clinical Immunization Safety Assessment (CISA) project is a network of vaccine experts and health centers that research and assist the CDC in the area of vaccine safety.[110]
CDC also runs a program called V-safe, a smartphone web application that allows COVID-19 vaccine recipients to be surveyed in detail about their health in response to getting the shot.[111]
The CDC Foundation operates independently from CDC as a private, nonprofit501(c)(3) organization incorporated in the State ofGeorgia. The creation of the Foundation was authorized by section 399F of thePublic Health Service Act to support the mission of CDC in partnership with the private sector, including organizations, foundations, businesses, educational groups, and individuals.[112][113] From 1995 to 2022, the foundation raised over $1.6 billion and launched more than 1,200 health programs.[114]Bill Cosby formerly served as a member of the foundation's Board of Directors, continuing as an honorary member after completing his term.[115]
The foundation engages in research projects and health programs in more than 160 countries every year, including in focus areas such ascardiovascular disease,cancer,emergency response, andinfectious diseases, particularlyHIV/AIDS,Ebola,rotavirus, andCOVID-19.[114]
In 2015,BMJ associate editor Jeanne Lenzer raised concerns that the CDC's recommendations and publications may be influenced by donations received through the Foundation, which includes pharmaceutical companies.[119]
For 15 years, the CDC had direct oversight over theTuskegee syphilis experiment.[120] In the study, which lasted from 1932 to 1972, a group of Black men (nearly 400 of whom had syphilis) were studied to learn more about the disease. The disease was left untreated in the men, who had not given theirinformed consent to serve as research subjects. The Tuskegee Study wasinitiated in 1932 by the Public Health Service, with the CDC taking over the Tuskegee Health Benefit Program in 1995.[120]
An area of partisan dispute related to CDC funding is studying firearms effectiveness. Although the CDC was one of the first government agencies to study gun related data, in 1996 theDickey Amendment, passed with the support of theNational Rifle Association of America, states "none of the funds available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control".[121] Advocates forgun control oppose the amendment and have tried to overturn it.[122]
Looking at the history of the passage of the Dickey Amendment, in 1992,Mark L. Rosenberg and five CDC colleagues founded the CDC's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, with an annual budget of approximately $260,000. They focused on "identifying causes of firearm deaths, and methods to prevent them".[123] Their first report, published in theNew England Journal of Medicine in 1993 entitled "Guns are a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home", reported "mere presence of a gun in a home increased the risk of a firearm-related death by 2.7 percent, and suicide fivefold – a "huge" increase."[123] In response, the NRA launched a "campaign to shut down the Injury Center." Two conservative pro-gun groups,Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership and Doctors for Integrity and Policy Research joined the pro-gun effort, and, by 1995, politicians also supported the pro-gun initiative. In 1996,Jay Dickey (R) Arkansas introduced the Dickey Amendment statement stating "none of the funds available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control" as a rider.[121] in the 1996appropriations bill."[123] In 1997, "Congress re-directed all of the money for gun research to the study of traumatic brain injury."[123]David Satcher, CDC head 1993–98[124] advocated for firearms research.[123] In 2016 over a dozen "public health insiders, including current and former CDC senior leaders" toldThe Trace interviewers that CDC senior leaders took a cautious stance in their interpretation of the Dickey Amendment and that they could do more but were afraid of political and personal retribution.[123]
In 2013, theAmerican Medical Association, theAmerican Psychological Association, and theAmerican Academy of Pediatrics sent a letter to the leaders of the Senate Appropriations Committee asking them "to support at least $10 million within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in FY 2014 along with sufficient new taxes at the National Institutes of Health to support research into the causes and prevention of violence. Furthermore, we urge Members to oppose any efforts to reduce, eliminate, or condition CDC funding related to violence prevention research."[125] Congress maintained the ban in subsequent budgets.[122]
In October 2014, the CDC gave a nurse with a fever who was later diagnosed withEbola permission to board a commercial flight toCleveland.[126]
The CDC has been widely criticized for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2022, CDC directorRochelle Walensky acknowledged "some pretty dramatic, pretty public mistakes, from testing to data to communications", based on the findings of an internal examination.[30]
The first confirmed case ofCOVID-19 was discovered in the U.S. on January 20, 2020.[127] However, widespread COVID-19 testing in the United States was effectively stalled until February 28, when federal officials revised a faulty CDC test, and days afterward, when theFood and Drug Administration began loosening rules that had restricted other labs from developing tests.[128] In February 2020, as the CDC's earlycoronavirus test malfunctioned nationwide,[129] CDC DirectorRobert R. Redfield reassured fellow officials on theWhite House Coronavirus Task Force that the problem would be quickly solved, according to White House officials. It took about three weeks to sort out the failed test kits, which may have been contaminated during their processing in a CDC lab. Later investigations by the FDA and theDepartment of Health and Human Services found that the CDC had violated its own protocols in developing its tests.[129][130] In November 2020,NPR reported that an internal review document they obtained revealed that the CDC was aware that the first batch of tests which were issued in early January had a chance of being wrong 33 percent of the time, but they released them anyway.[131]
In May 2020,The Atlantic reported that the CDC was conflating the results of two different types of coronavirus tests – tests that diagnose current coronavirus infections, and tests that measure whether someone has ever had the virus. The magazine said this distorted several important metrics, provided the country with an inaccurate picture of the state of the pandemic, and overstated the country's testing ability.[132]
In July 2020, the Trump administration ordered hospitals to bypass the CDC and instead send all COVID-19 patient information to a database at theDepartment of Health and Human Services. Some health experts opposed the order and warned that the data might become politicized or withheld from the public.[133] On July 15, the CDC alarmed health care groups by temporarily removing COVID-19 dashboards from its website. It restored the data a day later.[134][135][136]
In August 2020, the CDC recommended that people showing no COVID-19 symptoms do not need testing. The new guidelines alarmed many public health experts.[137] The guidelines were crafted by theWhite House Coronavirus Task Force without the sign-off ofAnthony Fauci of the NIH.[138][139] Objections by other experts at the CDC went unheard. Officials said that a CDC document in July arguing for "the importance of reopening schools" was also crafted outside the CDC.[140] On August 16, the chief of staff, Kyle McGowan, and his deputy, Amanda Campbell, resigned from the agency.[141] The testing guidelines were reversed on September 18, 2020, after public controversy.[142]
In September 2020, the CDC drafted an order requiring masks on all public transportation in the United States, but the White House Coronavirus Task Force blocked the order, refusing to discuss it, according to two federal health officials.[143]
In October 2020, it was disclosed that White House advisers had repeatedly altered the writings of CDC scientists about COVID-19, including recommendations on church choirs, social distancing in bars and restaurants, and summaries of public-health reports.[144]
In the lead up to 2020Thanksgiving, the CDC advised Americans not to travel for the holiday saying, "It's not a requirement. It's a recommendation for the American public to consider." The White House coronavirus task force had its first public briefing in months on that date but travel was not mentioned.[145]
The New York Times later concluded that the CDC's decisions to "ben[d] to political pressure from the Trump White House to alter key public health guidance or withhold it from the public [...] cost it a measure of public trust that experts say it still has not recaptured" as of 2022.[30]
In May 2021, following criticism by scientists, the CDC updated its COVID-19 guidance to acknowledge airborne transmission of COVID-19, after having previously claimed that the majority of infections occurred via "close contact, not airborne transmission".[146]
In December 2021, following a request from the CEO ofDelta Air Lines, CDC shortened its recommended isolation period for asymptomatic individuals infected with COVID-19 from 10 days to five.[147][148][149]
Until 2022, the CDC withheld critical data about COVID-19 vaccine boosters, hospitalizations and wastewater data.[150]
On June 10, 2022, the Biden Administration ordered the CDC to remove the COVID-19 testing requirement for air travelers entering the United States.[151]
During the pandemic, the CDCMorbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) came under pressure from political appointees at theDepartment of Health and Human Services (HHS) to modify its reporting so as not to conflict with what Trump was saying about the pandemic.[152]
Starting in June 2020,Michael Caputo, the HHS assistant secretary for public affairs, and his chief advisorPaul Alexander tried to delay, suppress, change, and retroactively edit MMR releases about the effectiveness of potential treatments for COVID-19, the transmissibility of the virus, and other issues where the president had taken a public stance.[152] Alexander tried unsuccessfully to get personal approval of all issues of MMWR before they went out.[153]
Caputo claimed this oversight was necessary because MMWR reports were being tainted by "political content"; he demanded to know the political leanings of the scientists who reported thathydroxychloroquine had little benefit as a treatment while Trump was saying the opposite.[152] In emails Alexander accused CDC scientists of attempting to "hurt the president" and writing "hit pieces on the administration".[154]
In October 2020, emails obtained byPolitico showed that Alexander requested multiple alterations in a report. The published alterations included a title being changed from "Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults" to "Persons." One current and two former CDC officials who reviewed the email exchanges said they were troubled by the "intervention to alter scientific reports viewed as untouchable prior to the Trump administration" that "appeared to minimize the risks of the coronavirus to children by making the report's focus on children less clear."[155]
A poll conducted in September 2020 found that nearly 8 in 10 Americans trusted the CDC, a decrease from 87 percent in April 2020. Another poll showed an even larger drop in trust with the results dropping 16 percentage points.[156] By January 2022, according to anNBC News poll, only 44% of Americans trusted the CDC compared to 69% at the beginning of the pandemic.[157] As the trustworthiness eroded, so too did the information it disseminates.[141] The diminishing level of trust in the CDC and the information releases also incited "vaccine hesitancy" with the result that "just 53 percent of Americans said they would be somewhat or extremely likely to get a vaccine."[156]
In September 2020, amid the accusations and the faltering image of the CDC, the agency's leadership was called into question. Former acting director at the CDC,Richard Besser, said of Redfield that "I find it concerning that the CDC director has not been outspoken when there have been instances of clear political interference in the interpretation of science."[158] In addition,Mark Rosenberg, the first director of CDC'sNational Center for Injury Prevention and Control, also questioned Redfield's leadership and his lack of defense of the science.[158]
Historically, the CDC has not been a political agency; however, theCOVID-19 pandemic, and specifically the Trump administration's handling of the pandemic, resulted in a "dangerous shift" according to a previous CDC director and others. Four previous directors claim that the agency's voice was "muted for political reasons."[159] Politicization of the agency has continued into the Biden administration as COVID-19 guidance is contradicted by State guidance[160] and the agency is criticized as "CDC's credibility is eroding".[161]
In 2021, the CDC, then under the leadership of the Biden administration, received criticism for its mixed messaging surrounding COVID-19 vaccines,mask-wearing guidance, and the state of the pandemic.[162][163]
On February 1, 2025, the CDC ordered its scientists to retract any not yet published research they had produced which included any of the following banned terms: "Gender, transgender, pregnant person, pregnant people, LGBT, transsexual, non-binary, nonbinary, assigned male at birth, assigned female at birth, biologically male, biologically female”.[34]Larry Gostin, director of the World Health Organization Center on Global Health Law, said that the directive amounted to censorship of not only government employees, but private citizens as well. For example, if the lead author of a submitted paper works for the CDC and withdraws their name from the submission, that kills the submission even if coauthors who are private scientists remain on it.[164] Other censored topics includeDEI,climate change, andHIV.[165][166]
Following extensive public backlash, some, but not all, of the removed pages were reinstated.[167] The CDC's censorship led to many researchers and journalists to preserve databases themselves, with many removed articles being uploaded to archival sites such as theInternet Archive.[168]
On February 4,Doctors for America filed a federal lawsuit against the CDC, Food and Drug Administration, and Department of Health and Human Services, asking the removed websites to be put back online.[169] On February 11, a judge ordered removed pages to be restored temporarily while the suit is being considered, citing doctors who said the removed materials were "vital for real-time clinical decision-making".[170][171]
On May 16, 2011, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's blogpublished an article instructing the public on what to do to prepare for azombie invasion. While the article did not claim that such a scenario was possible, it did use the popular culture appeal as a means of urging citizens to prepare for all potential hazards, such as earthquakes, tornadoes, and floods.[178]
According to David Daigle, the associate director for communications, public health preparedness and response, the idea arose when his team was discussing their upcoming hurricane-information campaign and Daigle mused that "we say pretty much the same things every year, in the same way, and I just wonder how many people are paying attention." A social-media employee mentioned that the subject of zombies had come up a lot onTwitter when she had been tweeting about theFukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster andradiation. The team realized that a campaign like this would most likely reach a different audience from the one that normally pays attention to hurricane-preparedness warnings and went to work on the zombie campaign, launching it right before hurricane season began. "The whole idea was, if you're prepared for a zombie apocalypse, you're prepared for pretty much anything," said Daigle.[179]
Once the blog article was posted, the CDC announced an open contest forYouTube submissions of the most creative and effective videos covering preparedness for azombie apocalypse (or apocalypse of any kind), to be judged by the "CDC Zombie Task Force". Submissions were open until October 11, 2011.[180] They also released a zombie-themed graphic novella available on their website.[181] Zombie-themed educational materials for teachers are available on the site.[182]
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had 10,899 employees in 2015 ...
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The agencys' former leaders say they could do more to explore the subject, but officials fear political – and personal – retribution.
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