Some 750 federal well being workers signed the letter two weeks after a gunman fired 180 bullets into CDC buildings.
Tons of of federal well being workers have written to United States Well being and Human Providers (HHS) Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, imploring him to “cease spreading inaccurate well being info”, weeks after a gunman fired hundreds of bullets into the headquarters of the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta.
Signatories to the letter on Wednesday, together with a whole bunch of present HHS workers, accused Kennedy of “sowing public distrust by questioning the integrity and morality of CDC’s workforce”, together with by calling the general public well being company a “cesspool of corruption”, throughout his 2024 failed presidential election campaign.
In addition they mentioned that Kennedy’s insurance policies, together with cuts to thousands of HHS workers, had been creating “harmful gaps in areas like infectious illnesses detection, employee security, and persistent illness prevention and response”.
“The deliberate destruction of belief in America’s public well being workforce places lives in danger,” the employees mentioned, noting that Kennedy had unfold false claims concerning the measles vaccine, undermining the general public well being outbreak response to the illness.
In addition they famous that the latest assault on the CDC constructing was one other instance of the risks ensuing from the well being secretary’s phrases.
The shooter, who had publicly expressed his distrust of COVID-19 vaccines, opened hearth on the CDC headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, fatally capturing police officer David Rose, 33, earlier than dying of a self-inflicted gunshot wound on August 8.
In a press release shared with US media shops, the HHS mentioned that “Secretary Kennedy is standing firmly with CDC workers – each on the bottom and throughout each middle – guaranteeing their security and wellbeing stay a prime precedence”.
Kennedy has lengthy been accused of spreading vaccine misinformation, together with in a 2019 go to to Samoa, which got here months earlier than a measles outbreak on the South Pacific island which killed 81 individuals, largely infants and younger kids.
In an interview with The Guardian newspaper earlier this 12 months, Samoa’s prime minister, Fiame Naomi Mataʻafa, expressed shock that Kennedy, who denies being in opposition to vaccines, was chosen as US well being secretary.
Extra lately, Kennedy has cancelled a whole bunch of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in funding for analysis into mRNA vaccines, a medical breakthrough credited with stopping hundreds of thousands of deaths from COVID-19 and having the potential to deal with illnesses akin to most cancers and HIV, in response to the Worldwide Vaccine Entry Middle at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg College of Public Well being.
William Foege, who served because the director of the CDC from 1977 to 1983, penned an article in US well being outlet Stat Information this week, urging public well being employees to “not again down”.
“We are going to stay by way of this drought of values, ideas, and info and once more apply our skills to bettering world well being and happiness,” he wrote.
Foege, who has been credited with enjoying an instrumental function in eradicating smallpox, a virus that was deadly in 30 p.c of circumstances, went on to warn that Kennedy’s phrases had been harmful.
“Within the meantime, be clear. Kennedy’s phrases could be as deadly because the smallpox virus. Individuals deserve higher,” he wrote.
