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In this article, Regan delves into federal layoffs and RFK's impact on the American healthcare system.
Cutting an artery: Federal Layoffs and the attack on American health
Cutting an artery: Federal Layoffs and the attack on American health
By Regan Snyder
By Regan Snyder
You are an employee of the FDA. Your job is to regulate products for public consumption, making sure they are safe and effective. Your work saves thousands of American lives. You wake up at 5:00 a.m. to an email from your employer. You have been laid off. You are not the only one. Thousands of workers in your field have all been cut overnight with no prior call or notice. One email has sent you swimming into a sea of uncertainty. You are unemployed with mouths to feed and bills to pay. Not only is your own life in danger, but also the lives of the innumerable Americans who rely on your work.
Starting Apr. 1, 2025, the Trump Administration began mass layoffs in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Chaos ensued as mass amounts of government employees unexpectedly lost their jobs. Some received emails, while others arrived to work to discover their security badges no longer worked. According to CBS News, HSS is heading towards a measly 62,000 active positions, which is a quarter less than their original staff. These layoffs are a part of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s plan to revamp HSS which, according to him, was, “not doing their jobs, and there was tremendous redundancy.” Although the HSS can’t be called perfect, erratically firing mass amounts of employees is an elementary solution to a much broader and more nuanced issue.
Photo by ABC News showing fired HSS employees
Cut just a few days short of her four-year anniversary as a health communication specialist with HSS, Alex Saint shares frustration with the thousands of affected Americans. Saint woke to an email at 5:14 a.m. informing her that she was one of 10,00 HSS workers who had been laid off. Saint has stated that “My position personally was not paid for by tax dollars. Nobody saved any money by me being let go.” Saint's testament has made it clear that Americans are deriving no benefits from these cuts. Not only are disease management, food and medicine regulation, addiction services, and health insurance programs at risk, but there is nothing positive to show for it. Americans are not saving money and the HSS has become no more effective than a wounded, bleeding animal.
Photo of Health Secretary RFK Jr. by CBS News
On top of all of this, RFK has no credentials to support his revision of the American health system. The new Health Secretary has been a long-time proponent of spreading medical misinformation, as well as criticizing vaccines and abortions, which is par for the course given that he has a degree in law and no public health or medical training. RFK’s medical beliefs include banning the fluoridation of water, a process that prevents thousands of cavities in children nationally, and drinking unpasteurized milk, a practice that can cause lethal bacterial infections. He has also pointed towards an imaginary link between vaccines and autism, a myth that's been long disproven. Daniel Salmon of John Hopkins Institute of Vaccine Safety has stated that correlated cases between vaccines and autism have all been “cherry-picked” with “no control group or control period.” The merit of vaccines is simply a fact to the vast majority of qualified doctors but, of course, not to RFK.
Recently, RFK has proclaimed Vitamin A to be an alternative to the measles vaccine. According to the CDC, research suggests that the measles vaccine gives recipients a 97% chance of avoiding the disease, while Vitamin A has no research guaranteeing any sort of immunity. Anti-vaccine parents have run with RFK’s advice and have gone about feverishly drowning their children in vitamin A in hopes of protecting them from the recent measles outbreak. Many of these children have been hospitalized with vitamin A toxicity, a condition where the vitamin builds up in the body and causes issues such as bone problems and liver damage. According to Texas pediatrician Dr. Lesley Motheral, “some of the more serious problems with vitamin A toxicity are not always reversible.” The person most at fault for this attack on American health is RFK himself. A quick look at his background and behaviors and it's clear to see that his HSS cuts are not aimed at helping the American people. RFK is uneducated and unqualified and, unfortunately, if things continue this way, lives will be lost.
The direction the American Health and Human Services System is heading is something that can not be ignored. At this point, RFK’s slogan of “Make America Healthy Again” is less of an encouraging motto and more of a cruel joke. The American government has utterly failed its people and every precaution meant to protect them from this gross misuse of power has been trampled upon. The HSS is on its deathbed and RFK is right beside it ready to pull its life support.
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