The Trump administration is suspending the activities of several public health agencies

President Trump has placed a temporary freeze at the National Institutes of Health on meetings, travel, communications and employment, citing the need to review protocols. The executive orders also temporarily halted the publication of regulations and guidance documents issued by numerous public health agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and the Food and Drug Administration. The breaks are expected to last until the beginning of February, but it seems that the cancellations or postponements of some activities carried out by public health bodies will last longer.

According to Science. Such grants finance the work and salaries of more than 300,000 people at more than 2,500 institutions. It is unclear when reviews will resume.

External communications referenced in the executive action include scientific reports, website updates, public health advisories, and certain conferences. According to STAT newsa Feb. 20-21 meeting of the National Vaccine Advisory Committee, a panel that advises Department of Health and Human Services leadership on vaccine policy, was also canceled.

The cancellations followed a directive issued this week by the acting director of the federal Department of Health and Human Services. It is not unprecedented for such pauses to take place when a new administration comes in. An NIH spokesman says that “this is a brief pause to allow the new team to establish a process for review and prioritization.” However, the measures appear more comprehensive than those implemented by previous administrations.

Word of mouth, for example, also extends to the CDC’s well-known weekly Morbidity and Mortality Report or MMWR. For the first time in its 64-year history, the MMWR went dark today.

In the words of the CDC, the MMWR is “the agency’s primary vehicle for the scientific publication of timely, reliable, authoritative, accurate, objective, and useful public health information and recommendations.” The report was originally created to disseminate the results of public health surveillance, both domestically and internationally.

A vivid example of how important MMWR is to public health when in June 1981 a group of five cases of Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia in youth in Los Angeles County was reported in MMWR. Previously, this disease was mostly seen in people with cancer or other immunosuppressive conditions. And so a cluster of cases in otherwise healthy young men was highly unusual. The doctor who treated four of the men, Michael Gottlieb, wanted to publish the cases in a medical journal but knew it would take months. After consulting with colleagues at the CDC, then editor Michael Gregg published the report in MMWR. Its impact was immediate, as clinicians across the country who had seen similar patients realized the connection to the cases reported in Los Angeles. Recognition of an emerging epidemic, later called AIDS, had begun.

of New York Times reports that the Trump administration’s suspension of MMWR could affect the timely communication of information on the nation’s escalating bird flu crisis. Additionally, Trump’s signing of an executive order withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization exacerbates the challenges facing public health.

None of what has happened so far is surprising given Trump’s statements on the presidential campaign trail and his cabinet picks. Overall, his choices to lead the public health apparatus seem to want to reshape the regulatory framework.

Also, Republicans in Congress want to reform the NIH and make changes to the ways in which its $47 billion research budget is allocated. The push for an overhaul of the agency comes in part from a desire to rebuild public trust after perceived failures in its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump’s nominee to lead the NIH, Jay Bhattacharya, tweeted at X this past fall that “it is not a virtue to exaggerate an infectious disease threat early in a pandemic to panic the population into compliance. It is not a vice to you look for data to understand the real risk.” Further, in response to his nomination by Trump, he wrote “we will reform America’s scientific institutions so they can be trusted again.”

Perhaps these statements provide clues as to what Bhattacharya may or may not do regarding policies related to pandemic preparedness. This is certainly important in light of the potential threat that bird flu can pose. But the NIH is much more than an agency that devises ways to plan for infectious disease outbreaks. It is a driving force behind research aimed at improving public health.

Would he, for example, go along with what his would-be boss, Health and Human Services Secretary-designate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has said and fire and replace 600 employees at the NIH? Or, as a consequence, would he seek to halve the number of NIH institutes and centers from 27 to 15, as Republican lawmakers have demanded? Trump’s release of restrictions on public health agencies this week could signal more draconian moves by his appointees in the future. Only time will tell.