The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars earmarked for public health work, but almost no one left to spend it, as Associated Press medical writer Mike Stobbe reports. Congress funded programs on Alzheimer’s disease, smoking cessation, epilepsy surveillance, sickle cell disease, and drowning prevention, yet the staff who ran them were laid off during last year’s restructuring under Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
Zombie Programs, Real Money
Some offices, like the $246 million Office on Smoking and Health, are functioning as “zombie programs” — funded on paper, hollow in practice. At a Senate hearing, Sen. Tim Kaine pressed new CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz on whether she’d spend the money as Congress intended. “Will you follow the law?” he asked. She replied, “I will always follow the law.”
Advocates say the gaps are already costing lives. “Without the experts, the coordination is not there across the country,” said Erika Sward, chief advocacy officer for UsAgainstAlzheimer’s.
Related on the SLP
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Related on the SLP
Viewpoint—Gutting the CDC: Survey of Current and Past CDC Workforce Accuses RFK, Jr. and Trump of Destroying the Agency and Endangering Public Health
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