The nation’s top public health agency says about 180 employees who were laid off two weeks ago can come back to work.
The CDC tells 180 staffers who were fired to come back (Image: Getty)
The country’s leading public health agency has announced that approximately 180 employees who were laid off two weeks ago are now eligible to return to work.
On Tuesday, emails were sent to some probationary employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who received termination notices last month, according to current and former CDC staff, reports the Associated Press.
An email viewed by the AP had the subject line “Read this e-mail immediately.”
It stated that “after further review and consideration,” a Feb. 15 termination notice was rescinded, and the employee was permitted to resume work on Wednesday.
The message read: “You should return to duty under your previous work schedule,” and “We apologize for any disruption that this may have caused.”
Approximately 180 individuals received reinstatement emails, as per two federal health officials briefed on the count but not authorized to discuss it, speaking on condition of anonymity.
It remains uncertain how many of the reinstated employees returned to work on Wednesday, and whether these employees will be exempt from anticipated widespread job cuts across government agencies.
The CDC is the latest federal agency attempting to bring back workers shortly after their dismissal as part of President Donald Trump’s and billionaire Elon Musk’s cost-cutting purge.
Similar reversals have occurred among employees responsible for medical device oversight, food safety, bird flu response, nuclear weapons, and national parks.
The Atlanta-based CDC is charged with protecting Americans from outbreaks and other public health threats. Before the job cuts, the agency had about 13,000 employees.
Last month, Trump administration officials told the CDC that nearly 1,300 of the agency’s probationary employees would be let go. That tally quickly changed, as the number who actually got termination notices turned out to be 700 to 750.
With 180 more people now being told they can return, the actual number of CDC employees terminated so far would seem to stand somewhere around 550. But federal health officials haven’t confirmed any specifics.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last month pledged “ radical transparency ” at the department, but HHS officials have not provided detail about CDC staff changes and did not respond to emailed requests on Tuesday and Wednesday. An agency spokesman, Andrew Nixon, previously told the AP only that CDC had more full-time employees after the job cuts than it did before the COVID-19 pandemic.
Those who received reinstatement emails included outbreak responders in two fellowship programs — a two-year training that prepares recent graduates to enter the public health workforce through field experience and a laboratory program that brings in doctorate-holding professionals.
