Layoffs Sweep Through US Health Agencies

HHS said the layoffs are expected to save $1.8 billion annually from the department’s $1.7 trillion budget. Employees across the massive U.S. Health and Human Services Department began receiving notices of dismissal Tuesday in an overhaul ultimately expected to lay off up to 10,000 people.

The cuts include researchers, scientists, doctors, support staff, and senior leaders, leaving the federal government without many of the key experts who have long guided U.S. decisions on medical research, drug approvals, and other issues.

At the National Institutes of Health, the world's leading health and medical agency, the layoffs occurred as its new director, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, began his first day of work.

“The revolution begins today!” Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote on social media as he celebrated the swearing-in of his latest hires: Bhattacharya and Martin Makary, the new Food and Drug Administration commissioner. Kennedy's post came just hours after employees began receiving emailed layoff notices.

Kennedy announced a plan last week to remake the department, which, through its agencies, is responsible for tracking health trends and disease outbreaks, conducting and funding medical research, and monitoring the safety of food and medicine, as well as for administering health insurance programs for nearly half the country.

The layoffs are expected to shrink HHS to 62,000 positions, lopping off nearly a quarter of its staff — 10,000 jobs through layoffs and another 10,000 workers who took early retirement and voluntary separation offers. Many of the jobs are based in the Washington area, but also in Atlanta, where the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is based, and in smaller offices throughout the country.

HHS said the layoffs are expected to save $1.8 billion annually from the department’s $1.7 trillion budget, most of which is spent on Medicare and Medicaid health insurance coverage for millions of Americans.

“They may as well be renaming it the Department of Disease because their plan is putting lives in serious jeopardy,” said Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington.

The CDC has not provided a breakdown of cuts, but employees in different parts of the organization described to AP extensive layoffs in programs that track asthma, air pollution, smoking, gun violence, reproductive health, climate change, and other health threats.

“Weakening tobacco prevention is a gift to Big Tobacco that would guarantee more addiction, disease, and death,” said Dr. Tom Frieden, the CDC’s director during President Barack Obama's administration, while cuts to the CDC’s global disease detection work will cost lives.

A coalition of state attorneys general sued the Trump administration on Tuesday, arguing the cuts are illegal, would reverse progress on the opioid crisis, and would throw mental health systems into chaos.

HHS has not provided additional details or comments about Tuesday’s mass firings, but on Thursday it provided a breakdown of some of the cuts.

• 3,500 jobs at the FDA
• 2,400 jobs at the CDC
• 1,200 jobs at the NIH
• 300 jobs at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Copyright 2025 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.