The crew of an Air Force C-17 unloads infant formula in Indianapolis in May 2022, part of a government effort to address a shortage of formula. At the time, President Donald Trump called the formula shortage a “national disgrace.” (Michael Conroy/AP)
Somewhere on a grocery shelf, or in a restaurant, or on a food-factory floor in America, lurk bacteria that haven’t been detected yet. Perhaps E. coli, which is linked with food poisoning, or more of the cronobacter that led to infant illnesses, sparked a nationwide shortage of infant formula in 2022 and led to major reforms at the Food and Drug Administration.
The task of finding those bacteria rests on FDA inspectors, whose jobs have been mostly preserved amid the Trump administration’s sweeping cuts to the federal government. But the people who help support those inspections haven’t fared so well. More than 150 people in the FDA’s Office of Inspections and Investigations — the staff responsible for purchasing supplies, managing trips and coordinating other administrative functions — were laid off last week, according to multiple federal officials. So were staff dedicated to food-safety policies and regulations, including an entire office that partnered with foreign countries to handle food-related disease outbreaks. Meanwhile, the FDA’s top food safety official — a position created after the infant formula crisis — resigned in February, citing “indiscriminate” staffing cuts to his office.
The cuts tee up “the next infant formula crisis waiting to happen,” said one current FDA official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of fear of reprisal.
The FDA, which last week laid off its entire media affairs team, did not respond to a request for comment. The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the FDA, did not respond to a request for comment. A White House spokesman said that FDA and other health agencies underperformed during the covid-19 pandemic and that recent staffing changes were intended to make the agencies more “nimble and strategic.”
Across the government, President Donald Trump and his allies have sliced billions of dollars and tens of thousands of staff from agencies focused on health and safety, such as the FDA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — cuts that are hollowing out longtime federal offices, shedding expertise, and appear to go against Trump’s repeated campaign promises to make Americans healthier and safer. The chorus of experts issuing warnings about the cuts include career civil servants who worked under both GOP and Democratic presidents, Republican lawmakers and former Trump officials who held top positions in the president’s first term.
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