{"id":25210,"date":"2025-04-02T21:40:52","date_gmt":"2025-04-02T21:40:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=25210"},"modified":"2025-04-02T22:27:45","modified_gmt":"2025-04-02T22:27:45","slug":"rfk-jr-falters-on-transparency-promise-amid-hhs-layoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=25210","title":{"rendered":"RFK Jr. Falters on Transparency Promise Amid HHS Layoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The health secretary had promised \u201cradical transparency,\u201d but fired communications teams in the Health and Human Services Department.<\/p>\n

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When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services in February, he promised<\/a> \u201cradical transparency\u201d and declared that \u201cboth science and democracy flourish from the free and unimpeded flow of information.\u201d<\/p>\n

But when the Trump administration laid off thousands of employees<\/a> on Tuesday, the targets included the very people who communicated the health department\u2019s work to Americans.<\/p>\n

Some of those employees were press officers, but many worked behind the scenes \u2014 on social media, newsletters, information campaigns and personal outreach \u2014 to translate complicated scientific studies into accessible guidance and to ensure that the recommendations and cutting-edge research produced in the department\u2019s dozens of offices reached the people who needed them.<\/p>\n

Their work included publicizing drug and food recalls, explaining the implications of new research and spreading awareness of treatments and preventive measures for diseases, according to seven people laid off from the communications offices of five H.H.S. agencies housed in the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health. Posts on LinkedIn indicated that the layoffs also hit people who communicated about infectious disease outbreaks.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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All seven people who spoke with The New York Times said their offices had lost most or all of their employees. Gillian SteelFisher, a principal research scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, described the situation as \u201ca profound loss for public health, and for the public\u2019s health.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGood public health is a partnership with the public,\u201d Dr. SteelFisher added. \u201cIt\u2019s about helping people make decisions and take actions that protect them and their loved ones, and to do that, fundamentally, you have<\/em> to be able to talk to people.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into<\/a>\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe<\/a>\u00a0for all of The Times.<\/p>\n

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The health secretary had promised \u201cradical transparency,\u201d but fired communications teams in the Health and Human Services Department.When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services in February, he promised \u201cradical transparency\u201d and declared that \u201cboth science and democracy flourish from the free and unimpeded flow of information.\u201dBut when the Trump administration laid off thousands of employees on Tuesday, the targets included the very people who communicated the health department\u2019s work to Americans.Some of those employees were press officers, but many worked behind the scenes \u2014 on social media, newsletters, information campaigns and personal outreach \u2014 to translate complicated scientific studies into accessible guidance and to ensure that the recommendations and cutting-edge research produced in the department\u2019s dozens of offices reached the people who needed them.Their work included publicizing drug and food recalls, explaining the implications of new research and spreading awareness of treatments and preventive measures for diseases, according to seven people laid off from the communications offices of five H.H.S. agencies housed in the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health. Posts on LinkedIn indicated that the layoffs also hit people who communicated about infectious disease outbreaks.All seven people who spoke with The New York Times said their offices had lost most or all of their employees. Gillian SteelFisher, a principal research scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, described the situation as \u201ca profound loss for public health, and for the public\u2019s health.\u201d\u201cGood public health is a partnership with the public,\u201d Dr. SteelFisher added. \u201cIt\u2019s about helping people make decisions and take actions that protect them and their loved ones, and to do that, fundamentally, you have to be able to talk to people.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25212,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25210","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25210"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25213,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25210\/revisions\/25213"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}