Nine former directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are talking, saying that the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is endangering the health of Americans.
Seven former directors and two former interim directors, whose holdings date back to the administration of former President Jimmy Carter, published a opinion article at the New York Times On Monday, a few days after the expulsion of the new director of the CDC, Dr. Susan Monarch.
The sources told ABC News that Kennedy and Stefanie Spear, their main deputy director of Cabinet, asked Monaez to support the changes in the Covid vaccine policy and the layoffs of high -level personnel, to which Monaz did not compromise.
The directors said that the elimination of Monarch is the last of a series of actions that could have a “broad impact” on the “health security of the United States.”
One of the co -authors, Dr. Richard Besser, president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and interim director of the CDC during the administration of former President Barack Obama, said he and his colleagues are surprised by what they have seen.
“What we are seeing in the Department of Health and Human Services, and in the CDC in particular, are not companies as usual,” he told ABC News. “There are always changes, different policy priorities when the administration changes. But what we are seeing under the leadership of Secretary Robert F. Kennedy [Jr.] It is completely different. “
“He has entered his role as Secretary of Health and Human Services with a strong agenda that focuses on dismantling our vaccine system in the United States and limiting people’s access to these interventions that save the life of health,” Besser added.
The HHS did not immediately respond to the request for comments from ABC News.
The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., speaks during a cabinet meeting with President Donald Trump in the White House Cabinet Room in Washington, on August 26, 2025.
Mandel and/AFP
In the opinion article, the former directors indicate several decisions made by Kennedy, including the dismissal of thousands of federal health workers, promoting unseeding treatments as measles extended in the US. UU. And canceling $ 500 million in the investigation of RNM vaccines financed by the federal government.
The directors also referred to the elimination of Kennedy of the 17 members of the CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee and replaced them with their own hand -selected members, many of which have shared vaccine opinions.
Besser said that the expulsion of Monarch, along with the resignation of at least four main leaders, forced him and his colleagues to speak.
He told ABC News that his departures leave the United States vulnerable to daily health challenges, as well as public health threats.
“We cannot predict when the next pandemic will be here, but we know that there will be future pandemics,” Besser said. “There will be other infectious threats. There will be other public health challenges, and with this secretary acting in the way it is, it puts us all at risk.”
He said that he and co -authors “do not agree on everything, but we agree that our Federal Public Health System is in great danger. The CDCs, which had been considered as the main public health institution in the world, is on a vital support and needs our attention immediately.”
The opinion article asked Congress to supervise HHS, which has the authority to do. It echoes a publication on social networks of Senator Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana), who said that the departure of the CDC leaders requires supervision of the Senate Committee that presides.
The former directors also asked the state and local governments to fill the financing holes left by some of Kennedy’s actions.
“We represent the people who served in each administration of Jimmy Carter through Donald Trump, Republicans and Democrats, and we were unified in our feeling that what we are seeing is extremely alarming and that Congress needs to intensify and perform its supervision function,” Besser told ABC News. “And so, we hope that our voices join some of the other voices that have been calling this and that Congress will do its part.”
