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Politico
27-05-2025
- Health
- Politico
CDC drowning safety team no longer afloat
Presented by With help from Danny Nguyen Driving The Day SAFETY NET GONE — Memorial Day, for many, marks the start of the swimming season. This year, the federal team that tracks drowning incidents and issues public water safety alerts has been disbanded, POLITICO's Sophie Gardner reports. In April, President Donald Trump laid off the team at the CDC responsible for drowning prevention work. Why it matters: That team regularly publicized the latest statistics for U.S. drowning deaths each May to inform families of the risks and also worked with partners like the YMCA and the American Red Cross to enroll at-risk children in swimming lessons. That collaboration has been halted. The cuts come as drowning deaths rose during the pandemic, hitting 4,300 in 2023, the most recent data, compared with around 4,000 in 2019. They rose even more among the youngest children, ages 1 to 4, for whom drowning is the No. 1 cause of death — according to the team's previously published numbers. 'I can't tell you how many media calls we got after that report was released because I think it was a shocking number to people, and they wanted to know what's going on,' said Amy Hill, who works on Chicago's water safety task force, referring to a CDC study released last May. 'When the CDC issues a report like that, people pay attention.' Work halted: States will continue to report drownings through the CDC's National Vital Statistics System, but the data will no longer have a team to analyze it. Two CDC scientists, who spoke with POLITICO on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, said the team had been close to publishing a handful of reports before the layoffs — including one on drowning deaths among people with autism. 'The way that this was done means that there [were] a lot of taxpayer dollars that were wasted here because there was work already in process,' a CDC official granted anonymity for fear of retribution told POLITICO about the layoffs. 'We could have done it in a way that did not undermine all of this critical work, especially for something like drowning, that literally nobody else is working on.' RFK Jr.'s view: At a Senate hearing on Trump's fiscal 2026 budget proposal Tuesday, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. broadly defended downsizing federal health agencies as necessary to stem what he described as bureaucratic bloat that occurred during the Biden administration and to restrain the federal deficit. But he wasn't specifically asked about the cuts to the drowning-prevention team. 'The safety and well-being of all Americans — especially our nation's children — is a top priority for HHS and Secretary Kennedy,' the HHS spokesperson told POLITICO in an email. 'The Department is strongly committed to preventing tragic and preventable deaths, including those caused by drowning.' The spokesperson did not respond to a follow-up question asking for details. WELCOME TO TUESDAY PULSE. We hope you had a relaxing Memorial Day weekend! I spent it watching the Indy 500 for the first time. Send your tips, scoops and feedback to ccirruzzo@ and khooper@ and follow along @ChelseaCirruzzo and @Kelhoops. In Congress JOHNSON'S SENATE PLEA — When the Senate returns the first week of June to consider the sweeping megabill passed through the House last week, House Speaker Mike Johnson has a plea for GOP senators: Don't make major changes, POLITICO's Gregory Svirnovskiy reports. 'I encourage them to do their work, of course, as we all anticipate,' Johnson told CNN's Jake Tapper on Sunday on 'State of the Union.' 'But to make as few modifications to this package as possible, because remembering that we've got to pass it one more time to ratify their changes in the House. And I have a very delicate balance here, very delicate equilibrium that we've reached over a long period of time. And it's best not to meddle with it too much.' Why? Jamming the megabill through the House the first time was a Herculean task for Johnson and his allies in leadership. It required a visit from President Donald Trump to the Capitol and careful negotiating by the speaker to bring the chamber's many coalitions aboard. Doing it a second time — with major changes from the Senate side — could prove impossible. What could change: Key senators are already looking to make modifications, with different factions holding that the bill goes too far in its approach to Medicaid and clean-energy tax credit cuts. Others, such as Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), say it doesn't move the ball far enough. Johnson wants to cut spending by roughly $6 trillion instead of the $1.5 trillion in the House bill. 'This is our only chance to reset that to a reasonable pre-pandemic level of spending,' Ron Johnson told Tapper, also on Sunday. 'And again, I think you can do it in the spending that we would eliminate, people wouldn't even notice. But you have to do the work, which takes time.' 'The problem is the math doesn't add up,' Paul told host Shannon Bream on 'Fox News Sunday.' 'They're going to explode the debt by the House says $4 trillion, the Senate's actually been talking about exploding the debt $5 trillion.' MURTHY ON SOCIAL MEDIA — As lawmakers work to push forward the Trump administration's megabill, former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy is calling on Congress to implement social media safeguards for children, POLITICO's Amanda Friedman reports. Why it matters: While the sweeping legislative package has implications for immigration, defense and health care, it gave limited attention to online safety or tech regulation. 'It's the equivalent of putting our kids in cars with no seat belts, with no airbags, and having them drive on roads with no speed limits and no traffic lights,' said Murthy, who served under former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, during an interview on NBC's 'Meet the Press' that aired Sunday. 'And that is just morally unacceptable. I think Congress has so far failed in its responsibility to protect our kids.' Efforts to establish rules for platforms popular among young people, like TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat, have long stalled amid industry lobbying and political gridlock. For a solution, Murthy called on Congress to implement 'real safety standards' for social media platforms, including issuing warning labels so that 'parents and kids are aware of the risks.' Murthy also stressed the importance of increasing data-transparency requirements for platforms, comparing the measure to the historical precedent of auto safety laws. 'Researchers routinely say they can't get the full data about the impact of these platforms on our kids' health from the companies,' Murthy said. 'But just like we did for cars a few decades ago, we'll be putting safety standards that got us seat belts, airbags, crash testing, and those have reduced the number of deaths.' 'But it's not too late,' Murthy said, referring to Congress. 'They need to step up and act now.' Lobbying 3 MUSKETEERS TAKE ON CAPITOL HILL — Mars Incorporated, the company that manufactures M&Ms, Skittles, Snickers and other popular candies, has hired a lobbying firm prominent in Republican circles as the Trump administration weighs crushing regulations on the artificial foods industry, Danny reports. A general disclosure filing shows the group hired the Duberstein Group, a lobbying firm founded by Ken Duberstein, who served as chief of staff to former President Ronald Reagan. The hiring comes as the confectionary industry braces for a crushing blow from the Make America Healthy Again Commission, a brainchild of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., which will unveil a regulatory framework to reel in the food and pharma industries that the group accuses of poisoning children and causing a surge in chronic disease. It also comes days after the first MAHA commission report, expected to emphasize the dangers of products used and produced by those sectors, but which barely mentioned those industries. The agrochemical, artificial food and farming industries have emphasized to lawmakers and Kennedy over the past weeks that any regulation could seriously hurt their bottom line. And if the first report is any indication, those lobbying efforts are working. On the Mars ticket are David Schiappa, a former secretary of the Senate Republican minority; Katherine Winkler Keating, a former chief of staff to Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.); Benjamin Howard, the former deputy assistant of legal affairs to President Donald Trump; and Elizabeth Kelley; who was former President Barack Obama's special assistant on economic policy. WHAT WE'RE READING NBC News reports on how artificial intelligence can address medical errors. The Wall Street Journal reports on a study showing that fears about food spoiling could be keeping some people from healthy foods.
Politico
27-02-2025
- Health
- Politico
CDC firings include key lab safety jobs
Presented by the Coalition for Medicare Choices With help from Sophie Gardner, Ruth Reader and David Lim Driving the Day LAB SAFETY EMPLOYEES SACKED — CDC staff cuts by the Trump administration eliminated several employees responsible for improving lab safety and testing for health threats — including mpox and H5N1 bird flu, Sophie reports. The CDC's Laboratory Leadership Service has two dozen fellows — roughly 20 of whom were informed on Feb. 15 that they would be placed on administrative leave until March 14 and then terminated. The fellows were working on performing lab safety assessments, standardizing tests for emerging health threats and improving wastewater surveillance. POLITICO talked with five of the fired employees, who were granted anonymity because they feared reprisals. 'It's going to be leaving a pretty big gap, and especially in this situation where we are dealing with multiple threats that could threaten public health and public safety,' one fellow told POLITICO. Why it matters: To date, roughly 700 probationary employees at the CDC have received termination notices. And although the LLS fellows are a fraction of the CDC staff the administration has cut or plans to as billionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency pushes to shrink government, their removal stands to have one of the more direct effects on public health. The fellows often have years or even decades of laboratory experience before being selected to work with the CDC. 'Public health is a fundamental component of national security. A strong state and local network underpins our national laboratory system,' said Dr. Michael Iademarco, past director of the CDC's Center for Surveillance, Epidemiology and Laboratory Services. 'And the strength of our system depends fundamentally on the Laboratory Leadership Service.' HHS did not respond to a request for comment. Details: A two-year fellowship at the CDC involves being embedded in local public health laboratories or working at the agency's headquarters in Atlanta. 'I was the only person really doing the work that I was doing,' said one fellow whose responsibilities included validating tests for accuracy and effectiveness during critical health threats. 'Now I'm not there to do it, so I hope somebody can pick that up. It was pretty pressing at the time.' Key context: The LLS fellowship was established in 2015 after an embarrassing series of biosafety incidents — including CDC researchers sending a sample of low-pathogenicity avian flu that was unknowingly contaminated with the highly contagious H5N1 virus to a USDA lab and possibly exposing personnel to 'potentially viable anthrax.' Dr. Tom Frieden, a former CDC director who created the program, warned that its end could lead to 'operational failures and safety incidents.' WELCOME TO THURSDAY PULSE. A survey found that 40 percent of toddlers have their own tablet device by age 2, NPR reports. Meanwhile, I had to beg my mom to let me have a cell phone when I turned 13. Send your tips, scoops and feedback to ccirruzzo@ and khooper@ and follow along @ChelseaCirruzzo and @Kelhoops. In Congress JOHNSON'S RED LINE — House Speaker Mike Johnson has rejected major potential cuts to Medicaid as part of the GOP's party-line package to advance President Donald Trump's agenda, report POLITICO's Ben Leonard and Mia McCarthy. Despite the House targeting at least $880 billion in savings from the Energy and Commerce Committee, Johnson confirmed that per-capita caps and changes to the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage won't be considered. 'We're not going to cut into those programs that way,' Johnson told CNN Wednesday night when asked whether he would cap federal funding or reduce match rates. 'We're talking about finding efficiencies in every program, not cutting benefits for people who rightly deserve them.' Those cuts could have produced significant Medicaid savings but would have shifted costs to states and led to benefit cuts. The possibility of such cuts had spurred concern among centrist Republicans, many of whom have a lot of Medicaid recipients in their districts. Abortion PLANNED PARENTHOOD RULING OVERTURNED — A three-judge panel at the conservative-leaning 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday reversed a lower court ruling that Planned Parenthood could be held liable for nearly $2 billion for defrauding Medicaid, POLITICO's Alice Miranda Ollstein reports. The unanimous but wonky procedural ruling overturns a lower court decision by U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk for the Northern District of Texas, a President appointee. The judge had ruled in 2023 that Planned Parenthood had to return funding from Texas' and Louisiana's Medicaid programs to provide services to low-income patients. Texas is also seeking more than a billion dollars in damages as the case continues. Details: The anonymous whistleblower who brought the case argued that Planned Parenthood's national organization should be financially liable because the group's lawyers wrongly advised their affiliates in Texas and Louisiana to continue billing Medicaid while the lawsuit played out. But the appeals court held Wednesday that a third party couldn't sue the attorneys for advice they gave to their own clients. The case now returns to the district court for further arguments on the remaining claims against the state affiliates. Big picture: Cutting state and federal funding to Planned Parenthood is a top priority of the anti-abortion movement, and this case was just one of many. Activists are also pushing in Congress, state legislatures and other lawsuits to block the provider from receiving money from Medicaid, the Title X family-planning program and other government sources. In the Courts PAUSE ON BAN EXTENDED — A federal judge in Baltimore extended an order blocking President Donald Trump's effort to cut off funds to hospitals and others who provide transgender-related treatment to people under 19. Judge Brendan Abell Hurson, a President Joe Biden appointee, extended the hold, set to expire Thursday, through March 5. Hurson had initially blocked enforcement of the ban on Feb. 13. The order, issued by Trump in his first few days in office, threatened the federal funding of health care providers that 'fund, sponsor, promote, or assist' young people in transitioning from their sex assigned at birth. AROUND THE AGENCIES VAX MEETING CALLED OFF — The FDA's outside vaccine advisers won't meet in March to identify the strains for next season's flu shots, POLITICO's Lauren Gardner reports. Dr. Paul Offit, a member of the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, said an agency officer notified him via email Wednesday that the March 13 meeting was canceled. Context: The committee routinely meets in March to recommend flu strains for inclusion in the seasonal vaccines, which are updated annually based on how the virus is spreading globally. The shots are made on a six-month production cycle, so the March recommendations would have set up the drug industry to deliver vaccines by September when flu vaccination campaigns begin. Why it matters: The cancellation comes amid a previously announced postponement of the CDC's own expert vaccine panel, which also meets regularly throughout the year to review the most recent data on vaccines and to vote on whether to recommend new shots for patients. The FDA didn't immediately comment. DOGE COMES TO FDA — Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency has arrived at the FDA, according to three people familiar with the visit and granted anonymity to discuss the effort. One of the people said Luke Farritor and Rachel Riley, who have been identified as members of DOGE, arrived at the White Oak campus in Silver Spring, Maryland, asking about its IT contracts. The visit is part of a larger effort by DOGE to curb government spending. Spokespeople for DOGE and FDA did not immediately respond to requests for comment. HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon declined to comment. CONCERNS ABOUT HRSA FIRINGS — More than half of the federal staff responsible for direct oversight of the nation's organ transplant system were let go in recent mass firings, two sources familiar with the situation told Pulse. The cuts affected an estimated 10-12 probationary employees at the Health Resources and Services Administration as part of a government-wide effort led by billionaire Elon Musk to cut spending. More cuts to federal agencies are expected. The cuts to HRSA have alarmed Democratic lawmakers and organ transplant advocates as the 40-year-old federal organ transplantation network undergoes a modernization effort that began in 2023 under a bipartisan law passed by Congress. More than 100,000 patients are waiting for an organ transplant, according to federal data. On Wednesday, Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, wrote to HHS urging the department to ensure staffing is adequate to lead the modernization. In the letter, the lawmakers ask how many HRSA staff members working on the transplant system remain and how HHS will 'provide adequate staffing and relevant experience and expertise to ensure continued improvements to the nation's organ donation and transplantation system.' HHS would not comment on the cuts. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who chairs the Senate Finance Committee and has also been involved in oversight of the modernization, told Pulse in a statement that he spoke with HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during his confirmation process about organ reform. 'I'm closely monitoring to ensure Congress' reforms are being implemented smoothly as the Trump administration works to ensure HRSA's staffing levels while ensuring efficient use of taxpayer dollars,' he said. WHAT WE'RE READING POLITICO's Lauren Gardner reports on Eli Lilly's nod to RFK Jr.'s chronic disease agenda. Healthcare Dive reports on slowed growth in Medicare Advantage, per a recent CMS report. Bloomberg reports that the Trump team is weighing pulling funding for Moderna's bird flu vaccine.
Politico
25-02-2025
- Business
- Politico
For fired fed workers, a rough road ahead
Presented by the Coalition for Medicare Choices With help from Sophie Gardner Driving the Day PATH FORWARD — D.C.-based law firms that specialize in federal employment law say they have gotten thousands of requests from fired federal workers, including those in health care agencies, for legal help to get their jobs back. But those firms warn the process could take years — with no guarantee of success, Chelsea reports. Context: The job losses are part of a Trump administration effort led by billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency to trim federal spending. A spokesperson for DOGE did not respond to requests for comment. Those dismissed at health agencies included probationary NIH, FDA, CDC and CMS staff, including medical device reviewers, frontline health care workers and Medicare employees. Some termination letters, obtained by POLITICO, justified firing employees because their 'performance has not been adequate.' Since the firings, 2,600 workers have filled out interest forms from law firm James & Hoffman regarding legal action, partner Danny Rosenthal said but had no further comment. Greg Rinckey, founding partner at Tully Rinckey PLLC, which specializes in federal employment law, told Pulse the firm has also received hundreds of calls from workers seeking assistance. A third firm, Alden Law, is asking fired workers to provide them with their personal information, their job title and agency, and a copy of their termination notice to support a complaint the firm is exploring to file with the Office of Special Counsel, per an email viewed by POLITICO. Alden did not respond to requests for comment. Still, firms warn it could be a rocky road ahead. A federal judge has allowed the mass firings to continue, denying a request for a temporary pause last week. Rinckey suggests that the termination letters' wording could be an attempt to avoid the so-called reduction-in-force language. A reduction in force is a specific regulatory process to dismiss federal workers that comes with legal protections. And while some workers might be eligible to appeal their case to the Merit Systems Protection Board, an entity housed in the Office of Special Counsel created to protect federal employees from being fired for partisan reasons, Rinckey warns it might not be able to do much. 'I don't think they're going to find an alliance with the MSPB,' Rinckey said, because they could argue that the cuts were nondiscriminatory across the board. James & Hoffman intends to bring a class-action appeal on behalf of terminated federal workers to the MSPB, according to an email viewed by Pulse, which would argue that federal agencies 'wrongly conducted a reduction in force without calling it a RIF.' But both Rinckey and James & Hoffman warn that this approach would take years and might be unsuccessful. WELCOME TO TUESDAY PULSE. We're anxiously awaiting the National Park Service's announcement of peak bloom dates for the D.C. cherry blossoms. Send your tips, scoops and feedback to khooper@ and ccirruzzo@ and follow along @Kelhoops and @ChelseaCirruzzo. In Congress REPUBLICANS' MEDICAID PLAN B — House Republicans are scrambling to find alternatives to steep Medicaid cuts they're considering as part of their sweeping domestic policy package, POLITICO's Meredith Lee Hill and Ben Leonard report. The search for a plan B comes as GOP leaders tee up their fiscal blueprint for floor action today. The bill targets $2 trillion in spending reductions, and swing-district members are nervous about the potential impact on safety-net programs their constituents rely on. Speaker Mike Johnson and other House leaders are exploring whether tariff revenue and savings from President Donald Trump's Department of Government Efficiency can primarily cover the extra $500 billion in spending cuts that the House Freedom Caucus negotiated earlier this month as Republicans' fiscal blueprint moved through the House Budget Committee, according to three people familiar with the conversations who were granted anonymity to speak freely. An after-hours confab: After private late-night talks Monday with Johnson, GOP leaders provided some generic but reassuring details about how they would protect certain Medicaid services and not cut into the share of federal payments for Medicaid. A group of swing-district Republicans and others representing redder areas were in the meeting, along with House Energy and Commerce Chair Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.). That panel is expected to deliver at least $880 billion in savings over the coming decade, with the bulk of those cuts likely coming from Medicaid. Leaving the meeting, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) said that Guthrie addressed some of the issues that had been of concern to her — including increasing the share of states' responsibility in the joint state-federal Medicaid program. She said she is now leaning toward voting for the budget plan. Some House Republicans who've doubted Johnson's budget plan said Monday night that they're more inclined to support the blueprint after GOP leaders ruled out certain cuts to Medicaid in a private meeting Key context: GOP leaders have assured a group of worried Republicans that they'll focus on 'waste, fraud and abuse' within the program and not cut benefits. But there are fears that lawmakers won't be able to reach the $880 billion threshold without cutting deeply into program benefits — which is why Republicans are furiously scrambling for any plausible alternatives. What's next: Johnson and other leaders indicated in the earlier private meetings that they plan to hold a vote this evening, according to four Republicans familiar with the conversations. But the progress is good news for Johnson, who's hoping to hold a floor vote on the budget plan Tuesday night. It advanced out of the Rules Committee on Monday night in a key procedural step. MEDICAID COST-SHIFTING — Some Republican proposals to cut federal Medicaid funding would either force states to significantly increase their spending or kick millions of people off the health insurance program for low-income people, according to an Urban Institute analysis published Monday. The analysis examined two scenarios: The first looked at the impact of eliminating the 90 percent federal matching rate if all states that have adopted Medicaid expansion kept the expansion in place. Those states would need $44.3 billion in state budget cuts or additional revenues that year to replace reductions in federal spending, the analysis found. The second scenario examined the impact of all states dropping Medicaid expansion in response to the loss of the enhanced federal matching rate. That would lead to 15.9 million people losing Medicaid or Children's Health Insurance Program coverage and a nearly 38 percent increase in the national uninsured rate, according to the analysis. DEMS PLOTTING — With the House Energy and Commerce Committee to adopt its oversight plans for the new Congress today, Democratic members intend to force Republicans to take difficult votes, POLITICO's Ben Leonard reports. Members of the minority party who sit on the powerful panel could propose amendments to the Republicans' 18-page plan outlining the committee's priorities, and some of those amendments could put Republicans on the record about their support for Medicaid. 'Democrats are going to offer amendments to address the glaring loopholes in Republicans' proposed oversight plan, which is consistent with what we've seen from Republicans over the last month as they stick their heads in the sand,' said a spokesperson for E&C Democrats in a statement. The oversight roadmap is similar thematically to the one adopted by the Energy and Commerce Committee in the previous Congress, which also focused on keeping the safety-net insurance program Medicaid and other health programs. 'Making sure taxpayer dollars are spent wisely is imperative to ensuring the long-term sustainability of each program so that [Medicaid] can continue to support the most vulnerable, especially pregnant mothers, children, seniors, and the disabled,' reads the proposed oversight plan. AROUND THE AGENCIES EXAMINING THE HIGH-RISK LIST — The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee will hold a hearing today on the list of federal programs, including HHS programs, deemed to be at the highest risk of waste, fraud and abuse. Why it matters: The list maintained by the Government Accountability Office is being eyed by the Trump administration's unofficial Department of Government Efficiency, an effort to trim federal spending. While the hearing notice issued by Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) doesn't mention HHS by name, its public health emergency leadership was added in 2022 after the GAO said it found deficiencies in the department's preparation for and handling of emergencies. The office has called for stronger communication and more coordination among HHS agencies and offices as well as improved data-sharing practices for public health crises. Other areas within HHS that have been on the list for a number of years include the integrity of the Medicaid program, the management of health programs for American Indian and Native Alaskan populations and food-safety oversight. According to the GAO, the department has taken some corrective action on those programs since being placed on the list. Public Health LISTERIA OUTBREAK BLAMED FOR 12 DEATHS — A Listeria outbreak that has sickened 38 people and killed 12 is tied to supplement shakes distributed in long-term care facilities, according to a food safety alert released by the CDC on Monday. The shakes, under the brand names Sysco Imperial and Lyons ReadyCare, were recalled on Saturday. They were sent to 'institutional settings' — like long-term care facilities — nationwide and typically given to people on soft diets. The outbreak began in 2018, though more than half of the people affected got sick in 2024 or 2025. 'It is common for Listeria outbreaks to last several years because it is an incredibly hardy germ that can survive on surfaces for long periods of time,' according to the alert. Names in the News Patrizia Cavazzoni will join Pfizer as chief medical officer, POLITICO's David Lim reports. Cavazzoni was formerly the top regulator of the FDA's drug division. Aliza Silver will be senior director of health policy and government affairs at Oracle. She previously was deputy health policy director for the Senate HELP Committee. WHAT WE'RE READING STAT's Helen Branswell reports on the U.S. joining a flu vaccine meeting led by the World Health Organization, despite the Trump administration's plans to withdraw from the agency. KFF Health News' Aneri Pattani reports on how a Kentucky town spent $15,000 of its opioid settlement money on an ice rink. POLITICO's Alice Miranda Ollstein, Rachel Bluth, Cris Seda Chabrier and Maya Kaufman report on how gender-affirming services are in limbo despite court orders putting federal restrictions on hold.
