Another lab, the only one in the United States capable of testing for and tracking antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea, often called “super gonorrhea,” was also recently effectively shut down.
The lab firings were part of the 2,400 staff laid off from the CDC. While officials at the Department of Health and Human Services have said the job reductions are aimed at refocusing the agency “on emerging and infectious disease surveillance, outbreak investigations, preparedness and response,” lab experts say the reductions contradict that goal.
The group has written a letter to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asking for the personnel to be reinstated. “Their loss eliminated critical national testing services that do not exist anywhere else within the HHS agencies,” the letter said.
“In essence, we’re flying blind,” Becker said in an interview.
An HHS spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
The increase in hepatitis C infections has been “stupendous in the past 20 to 25 years,” said Judith Feinberg, a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at West Virginia University.
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