The Trump administration’s health communications “pause” is unique 

By May 1981, a doctor in Los Angeles was noticing something unusual: previously healthy young men falling ill with a pneumonia usually associated with cancer. Michael Gottlieb, the physician, knew it would take months to publish his observations in a scientific journal. Instead, he turned to the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) publication that has been publishing scientific reports to “guide public health action” since the 1950s, according to a 2011 historical review. The CDC report quickly published Gottlieb’s findings. Soon, doctors around the country began noting similar findings, acknowledgement that the AIDS epidemic had begun.

The long history of the weekly report is now on at least temporary hold. The Washington Post reported Wednesday that the Trump administration has issued a directive for the CDC to halt external communications, including the report. Some observers say a pause in communications is not unusual for an incoming administration; it’s a chance for new officials to get a lay of the land. In one sense, however, pausing the weekly report is, in fact, unusual. The agency’s report has kept up publication in the days following a presidential transition for at least three decades. According to archives of the report, the government continued to publish even after changes in the party controlling the White House. On Jan. 20, 2017, the day of President Donald Trump’s first inauguration, the CDC published an issue, as it did in the weeks that followed. But Thursday’s expected release did not occur.

The Washington Post cited “several” anonymous sources in health agencies who worried about the overall pause, given the Trump administration’s efforts to tightly control health agency communication during the COVID-19 pandemic. Outside experts also criticized the communications pause, including its effect on the weekly report. “If this gag order delays tomorrow’s publication we should be prepared for the actions of the Trump’s first administration to become standard of his second,” a video by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a health focused nonprofit, said.

Other unnamed health officials told The Post that they were assuming “good intentions,” that the Trump team was just “disorganized,” and that the pause was about the new team catching its breath. If it lasted longer than a week or two, an official said, it would be concerning.

Responding to questions about the pause in the publication of the weekly report, a CDC spokesperson told the Bulletin, “ [The Department of Health and Human Services] has issued a pause on mass communications and public appearances that are not directly related to emergencies or critical to preserving health. This is a short pause to allow the new team to set up a process for review and prioritization. There are exceptions for announcements that [departmental] divisions believe are mission critical, but they will be made on a case-by-case basis.”

The Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report has previously been at the center of allegations of political interference by the Trump administration. Media reports from 2020 detailed alleged efforts by the administration, then facing criticism for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, to “gain control” of the report, which sometimes offered technical information that pointed to apparent flaws in the administration’s pandemic response, such as its travel bans. CNN reported an allegation that the administration was seeking to stop publication of some of the reports “all together.”

The pause in publication comes as the H5N1 avian influenza outbreak among birds, dairy cattle, and other mammals continues to keep health experts on edge, given concerns about whether the virus could become deadlier and more contagious in humans. A Louisiana man died earlier this month, the first fatality in the United States. The Post reported that this week’s edition of the report was to include reports on the virus.

It also comes as public health experts and scientists worry about the impact that Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department, will have on public health efforts, including vaccination policy, and scientific research in general. The longtime anti-vaccine activist wants to redirect US health efforts to prioritize chronic diseases instead of infectious diseases. He has said he wants to fire hundreds of employees at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which funds biomedical research, including studies of pathogens.

Science reported Wednesday that new restrictions on NIH, which, along with the CDC, operates under the umbrella of the Health and Human Services Department and is therefore also subject to the communications pause, have led to a training being cancelled as it was happening, grant review panel meetings being canceled, and other abrupt changes.

A memo from a top official in the Health and Human Services Department, obtained by various media, said the communications pause will end on Feb. 1.