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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Mallory Harris, PhD @malar0ne.bsky.social · 14m

"The administration may claim that some of these RIFs were ‘errors’. By extension, they may try and argue that many RIFs were ‘correct’. We should assume otherwise: the wholesale use of RIFs is a form of political retribution that does not serve federal agency missions. This is a failure by design."

Joshua Weitz @joshuasweitz.bsky.social · 17h

New post:

With Malice Toward All and Charity for None:
Oct. 10-11 CDC (Un)Firing Edition

joshuasweitz.substack.com/publish/post...

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 37m

Could have been worse

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Kyle Griffin @kylegriffin1.bsky.social · 3h

Sens. Schumer, Merkley, Murray, and Peters are calling for the resignation of OMB Director Russell Vought.

"By impounding billions of dollars … and aggressively pursuing the illegal use of pocket rescissions, Vought has done everything in his power to gut the federal government piece by piece."

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Alt CDC (they/them) @altcdc.altgov.info · 2h

For anyone still fired that we missed, let us know! We know there are many more but there is no HR office to ask.

“All I maintain is that on this earth there are pestilences and there are victims, and it’s up to us, so far as possible, not to join forces with the pestilences.”
- Camus

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

David Cooper @davidbcooper.bsky.social · 4h

Rosie the Ribbiter

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Pure Science @purescience.news · 1d

Drummond Rennie obituary #Science #Other hashtag 1 2 3

Drummond Rennie obituary

Doctor and medical editor who inaugurated the International Congress on Peer Review and Scientific Publication In deciding what research to publish and how to appraise it, medical journals bear a heavy...

purescience.news

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 4h

*sorry, MMWR

Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Mark Histed @markhisted.org · 19h

Looks from here like the goal is to create confusion, and focus public attention on a subset of the most outrageous firings — to distract from the other firings.

We shouldn’t be fooled, and should demand that all the illegal shutdown RIFs are made null and void. /end

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 18h

According to the Washington Post, at least some EIS officers will be reinstated

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 19h

No need to imagine

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Alt CDC (they/them) @altcdc.altgov.info · 19h

Many RIFed yesterday are now being unfired(?!)

Unclear if it’s evil or incompetence — but either way, calculated move. Meant to flex power.

Ha. Just shows Republicans are scared.

Dems, @schumer.senate.gov — don’t back down.
They know they’re losing the Republican shutdown shitshow.
We’re winning.

Official HHS memo showing someone RIFed yesterday is, um, no longer RIFed. wtf

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 19h

Well, this inspires confidence.

"At least some workers were let go by mistake. Members of the MMWR team were laid off in error because of a misclassification of job codes and would be brought back, as would anyone working on measles and the Ebola outbreak in Congo."

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/h...

www.nytimes.com

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Lena Sun @lenasun.bsky.social · 1d

NEW: @CDCgov hit hard by massive firings that several staff describe to me as a “bloodbath.”
Among those RIFd:
—leadership of the center for immunization and respiratory diseases;
—leadership of global health center
—leadership of the measles outbreak response; 1/4

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 21h

“One of the government labs being proximate to the origins of Lyme disease.”

FFS, is this guy ignorant. Genomic analysis indicates that the Lyme spirochete has been circulating in North America for 60,000 years (Walter et al. Nat Ecol Evol 2017).

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Angie Rasmussen @angierasmussen.bsky.social · 1d

For more information about the Friday night massacre at CDC, I wrote up an analysis of who got terminated and what that means for public health.

Grateful to @saveamericamvmt.bsky.social for supporting and amplifying. We are in really terrible trouble.

rasmussenretorts.substack.com/p/the-death-...

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 22h

“The battle is not over, argued a fired official, who called upon Congress to use its authority to rein in the executive branch.”

Carl Zimmer @carlzimmer.com · 22h

“The White House’s mass firing of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention staff on Friday has decimated offices related to injury prevention, respiratory disease surveillance, and chronic disease.” www.statnews.com/2025/10/11/c...

‘It’s a massacre’: CDC battered by government shutdown firings

The White House’s mass firing of CDC staff on Friday has decimated offices related to injury prevention, respiratory disease surveillance, and chronic disease, according to four people familiar with t...

www.statnews.com

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 22h

Per CDC source: At internal leadership meeting this afternoon, it was shared that 1,257 people were RIF'd at CDC. Number may not be final. Apparently, chief of staff was unaware that RIFs were going to occur so not clear who is making decisions. (Short 🧵)

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Dave Levitan @davelevitan.bsky.social · 23h

“We can give $20 billion to Argentina but we can’t afford the CDC’s measles experts” is a hell of an argument

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

BK. Titanji @boghuma.bsky.social · 1d

The parents of those 270 kids could get them vaccinated so the can return to school 🤷🏽‍♀️.
www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...

Hundreds of U.S. students quarantined amid measles outbreaks

At least 270 unvaccinated kids are staying home from school as measles continues to spread nationwide. "Expect more," one expert said.

www.nbcnews.com

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Ferric Fang, MD @fangferric.bsky.social · 1d

Free of charge, MMRW has been providing indispensable information on:

• influenza
• invasive streptococcal infections
• HIV
• meningococcal disease
• RSV
• Salmonella
• rabies
• baylisascariasis

And that's just in the past 3 months. An irreplaceable loss. Only a psychopath would destroy it.

Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · 1d

Fustiliarian Friday: Trump/Kennedy/GOP use the shutdown as an excuse to destroy the CDC’s elite field epidemiology team and one of the most important epidemiology journals in the world.

Gift link.

Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials

www.nytimes.com

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 1d

I've yet to see this properly analysed from a psychological point of view. Obviously RFK is a nut, but there's also a broader pattern in the GOP ranks that seems deeply peculiar, of wanting positively to welcome the threat of disease and death. It feels like a collective psychosis.

Amy Maxmen, PhD @amymaxmen.bsky.social · 1d

The Trump admin is in the midst of laying off 1,100-1,200 HHS staff. The CDC's outbreak responders, gone. The office producing CDC's weekly journal MMWR is gone. CDC staff securing sensitive data, gone. Worker safety, gone. Immunization group, gone.

Instead, Congress watches RFK "make the proof"

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 3d

RFK Jr on Tylenol and autism: "It is not proof. We're doing the studies to make the proof."

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Jeremy Berg @jeremymberg.bsky.social · 1d

My quote of the day

Nobody ever thanks you for saving them from the disease they didn't know they were going to get.

William Foege

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Elizabeth Jacobs, PhD @elizabethjacobs.bsky.social · 1d

The editors of the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) were apparently fired today.

The precursor to MMWR began in 1878 to address emerging public health threats rapidly.

We are not “great” without it. We are vulnerable to threats from sporadic foodborne illness to bioterrorism.

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Caitlin Rivers @cmyeaton.bsky.social · 1d

For the 2nd week in a row, the federal shutdown has blocked disease surveillance reporting. So Team Force of Infection again visited all 50 state websites to track COVID, flu & RSV. caitlinrivers.substack.com/p/outbreak-o...

Outbreak Outlook: Week 2 of DIY Surveillance

State by state disease surveillance of COVID-19, influenza and RSV amid federal public health cuts

caitlinrivers.substack.com

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Reposted by Ferric Fang, MD

Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · 1d

There must be some mistake, I read 50 Atlantic articles about how RFK Jr just wants to help Americans eat more vegetables

Gravel Influencer @gravelinfluencer.bsky.social · 1d

They continue to eviscerate the public health machinery that has quietly kept Americans, and others around the world, safe and healthy for decades.

The staff of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the journal that reports on health trends and emerging infectious threats, was also laid off. The publication’s storied history includes a June 1981 report that five previously healthy gay men were treated for an unusual pneumonia — the first hint of the AIDS epidemic.

Roughly 70 Epidemic Intelligence Service officers — the so-called “disease detectives” who respond to outbreaks around the globe — received layoff notices, according to a person familiar with them. The service was spared during an earlier round of layoffs in February.

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