​This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted online its first large tranche of advanced genetic data from measles viruses spreading last year. Scientists with knowledge of the operation expect the agency to post heaps more in weeks to come, revealing whether the U.S. has lost its hard-won measles elimination status.. Use Our Content. It can be republished for free.. The CDC withheld the data for months as a team hit hard by mass layoffs and resignations sorted through the information. But now that scientists at the agency have posted their first batch of whole measles genomes — the genetic blueprint of the viruses — the rest should “start flowing more smoothly at a more rapid cadence,” said Kristian Andersen, an evolutionary virologist at the Scripps Research Institute who isn’t involved with the CDC’s effort but is following it.. The CDC did not answer queries from KFF Health News on its timeline for publishing measles data or analyses. However, once all the data is public, researchers can run quick initial analyses that will signal whether outbreaks across the U.S. last year resulted from the continuous spread of the disease between states, rather than separate introductions from abroad. If there was continuous transmission for a year, that means the U.S. has lost its status as a country that has eliminated measles. That status, which the U.S. has held since 2000, reflects a country’s vaccination rates: Two doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine prevent most infections and so stop outbreaks from growing.. More careful analyses take weeks.. “We should see a report in April,” Andersen said, “assuming no political interference.”. Email Sign-Up. Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free weekly newsletter, “The Week in Brief.”. Your Email Address Sign Up. This is the first time that the U.S. has applied sophisticated genomic techniques to measles, which largely disappeared from the country a quarter-century ago because of broad vaccine uptake.. Declining vaccination rates, misinformation, and the Trump administration’s budget cuts and lagging response to outbreaks have fueled a resurgence of the disease. With at least 2,285 cases in 44 states, 2025 was the worst year for measles in more than three decades. This year is on track to surpass that, with 1,575 cases as of late March.. While welcoming the science, researchers say the government’s top priority should be to stop the virus from spreading.. “I think it’s incredibly important to do whole genome sequencing for outbreaks,” Andersen said, “but we shouldn’t need to do this for measles in the first place, because we have an extremely effective and safe vaccine.”. “That we’re even talking about this is nuts,” he added.. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other government officials should sound an alarm about measles’ comeback and launch nationwide vaccine campaigns, said Rekha Lakshmanan, executive director of  

​President Donald Trump will soon nominate a permanent director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, its acting chief, National Institutes of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya, told agency employees at a Wednesday staff meeting.. This story also ran on CBS News. It can be republished for free.. According to a recording obtained by KFF Health News, Bhattacharya at one point suggested to CDC staff that Trump could name a new leader for the agency as soon as Thursday. “But if not, I don’t think much will change,” he said.. Though his official position as acting director was set to expire Wednesday, Bhattacharya will continue to lead the agency until the top spot is filled. Meanwhile, news outlets including Axios and The Washington Post reported that the administration was postponing filling the permanent director job amid the challenges of gaining Senate confirmation and other political pressures.. Bhattacharya opened the meeting by acknowledging the struggles the beleaguered agency has gone through over the past year. Workers faced waves of job losses, and a gunman attacked the CDC’s Atlanta campus in August, killing a police officer and causing significant property damage. “I want to acknowledge very honestly that I know that it has been such a difficult year for the CDC and for every single one of you here,” Bhattacharya said.. He said the agency has begun to fill its leadership gaps. During his first meeting with the agency’s top leaders, he said, “I noticed almost every single one of them is acting.”. “We’ve made progress in filling key roles across the agency,” he said. “Leadership stability is essential to delivering our mission.”. The aim, he said, is to leave the agency in “a solid, secure place” so it can do its work “without so much of the turmoil that we’ve seen the last year.”. Email Sign-Up. Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free weekly newsletter, “The Week in Brief.”. Your Email Address Sign Up. Bhattacharya invited questions from the CDC staffers, who repeatedly asked about staffing losses, morale, and their job security, as well as Trump’s decision to withdraw from the World Health Organization.. “The politics of WHO withdrawal are above my pay grade,” Bhattacharya said. “What I do know is that without the CDC, the world will be in much worse health.”. Workforce Concerns. One employee told Bhattacharya the agency had lost a “huge amount” of “internal capacity and expertise in the past year” and it “continues to be very challenging for staff to do their jobs,” adding that “certain conditions are a bit demoralizing.”. The CDC can “function without leaders,” another speaker said. “We function without directors. And this entire team will make CDC run without you if you’re not here.”. Schedule F, an effort to reclassify certain federal employees in policy-related roles and reduce their civil service protections, drew some of the strongest statements from  

​[embedded content]. This article is from a partnership that includes WABE, NPR, and KFF Health News. It can be republished for free.. On the coffee table at her home in Atlanta, Sarah Boim has a pile of documents from her old job at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They are printouts of her employment records.. Boim lost her job in the first big wave of CDC firings — more than 1,000 people were suddenly let go last February.. “This is the termination letter. I also printed off my performance review from 2024,” she said. “I knew I wouldn’t have access to it, and everything was so chaotic that I needed proof of what was happening.”. Boim worked in the National Center for Environmental Health/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, handling communications about radon, substances known as forever chemicals, lead poisoning, and other health threats.. Rereading her termination letter, she still can’t believe what it says.. Former CDC employee Sarah Boim rereads her termination letter at home in Atlanta. Boim lost her job in the first big round of firings in mid-February 2025, just weeks into the second Trump administration.(Jess Mador/WABE). “The agency finds you are not fit for continued employment because your ability, knowledge, and skills do not fit the agency’s current needs, and your performance has not been adequate to justify further employment at the agency,” the emailed letter reads.. “And that floored me,” Boim said, “because my performance was rated outstanding, and I even got a raise. It was just deeply insulting. So I was more upset than I think I was prepared to be.”. The Trump administration later brought back some of the workers who were fired in the first round, but it has also cut more staff and funding.. Email Sign-Up. Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.. Your Email Address Sign Up. The CDC has been without a permanent director for more than six months. Recently the Trump administration made Jay Bhattacharya the CDC’s interim director, while he also runs the National Institutes of Health.. The leadership uncertainty comes amid a year of disruption and dismissals at the Atlanta-based institution, from which more than 3,000 public health workers are now gone. That includes staffers the Trump administration terminated and workers who accepted early retirement.. Ripple effects of the turmoil are still hitting the Atlanta region.. By the end of 2025, the CDC had lost roughly a quarter of its workforce.. Dozens of protesters rally across the street from CDC headquarters in Atlanta, marking a year since mass firings began at the agency under the Trump administration. Affecting thousands of workers at multiple federal agencies, the cuts began around Feb. 14, 2025, leading some CDC staffers to dub it the “Valentine’s Day massacre.”(Jess Mador/WABE). Boim now works as a contractor in the health field, while also working a non-health-related freelance job. But she mo  

​La paciente fue por primera vez a ver a Mark Supiano en 2017 porque su familia estaba preocupada: estaba perdiendo la memoria a corto plazo.. Sobre Noticias En Español. Noticias en español es una sección de KFF Health News que contiene traducciones de artículos de gran interés para la comunidad hispanohablante, y contenido original enfocado en la población hispana que vive en los Estados Unidos.. Use Nuestro Contenido. Este contenido puede usarse de manera gratuita.. Detalles. Hablemos de Salud. Forma parte del grupo de Facebook de KFF Health News en español KFF Health News-Hablemos de Salud”.. KFF Health News – Hablemos de Salud. Mientras revisaba su historial y signos vitales, Supiano, geriatra en la Universidad de Utah, observó una señal preocupante: su presión arterial era de 148/86, por encima de lo normal a pesar de que tomaba dos medicamentos para bajarla. “Claramente era demasiado alta”, dijo recientemente.. Varios factores podrían haber contribuido a ese número, incluidos el medicamento antiinflamatorio que la mujer de 78 años tomaba para el dolor de artritis, una dieta alta en sodio y la falta de ejercicio regular. También le dijo a Supiano que solía beber un par de copas de vino cada noche.. Después de que Supiano hablara con ella sobre formas de reducir su riesgo, la mujer y su esposo se inscribieron en un gimnasio. Dejó el antiinflamatorio y redujo la sal y el alcohol, lo que llevó su presión sistólica a un rango de 130 a 140 —todavía hipertensión, según las guías publicadas por la Asociación Americana del Corazón (AHA) y el Colegio Americano de Cardiología (ACC) a finales de ese año, pero más aceptable. (La sistólica es el número superior en la medición de la presión arterial y el más importante desde el punto de vista clínico).. Sin embargo, para 2019, la paciente tenía un diagnóstico de deterioro cognitivo leve y comenzaban a surgir evidencias médicas sobre la relación entre la hipertensión (el término médico para presión arterial alta) y la demencia. “No fui tan agresivo como debí haber sido”, recordó Supiano. Agregó un tercer medicamento para la hipertensión y sus cifras bajaron a 120 o menos.. Las guías cambiantes para el control de la presión arterial pueden recordar a las personas de mayor edad un baile de moda en su juventud: el limbo. Como decía Chubby Checker: “¿Qué tan bajo puedes llegar?”. Durante más de 25 años, una lectura de 140/90 o menos se consideró normal, según las guías de la AHA/ACC. Pero la actualización de 2017 introdujo cambios importantes, respaldados por los resultados del ensayo SPRINT, que incluyó a adultos mayores de 50 años con alto riesgo cardiovascular.. El ensayo SPRINT encontró que un tratamiento intensivo dirigido a reducir la presión sistólica por debajo de 120 disminuía el riesgo de ataques cardíacos, accidentes cerebrovasculares, otras enfermedades cardiovasculares y la mortalidad general de manera tan significat  

​KFF Health News senior correspondent Renuka Rayasam discussed the KFF Health News series “Priced Out,” which focuses on the health insurance crisis, on An Arm and a Leg on March 19.. Click here to hear Rayasam on An Arm and a Leg (starts at 21:03).. Read Rayasam’s “When Health Insurance Costs More Than the Mortgage.”. KFF Health News rural health reporter Andrew Jones discussed the spread of measles across the Carolinas on WUNC’s Due South on March 17.. Click here to hear Andrew Jones on Due South.. Read Jones’ “Hospitals Fighting Measles Confront a Challenge: Few Doctors Have Seen It Before.”. Céline Gounder, KFF Health News’ editor-at-large for public health, discussed on CBS News 24/7’s The Daily Report on March 16 how U.S. hospitals and insurers are turning to AI to settle disputes over medical claims and payments. On March 17, she outlined the court ruling blocking the Trump administration’s vaccine policy changes for children on CBS News’ CBS Mornings. Gounder also discussed Susie Wiles’ decision to stay on as White House chief of staff amid breast cancer treatment on CBS News 24/7’s The Takeout on March 16.. Click here to watch Gounder discuss hospitals, insurers, and AI on The Daily Report.. Click here to watch Gounder discuss vaccine policy changes for children on CBS Mornings.. Click here to watch Gounder discuss White House chief of staff Susie Wiles on CBS Mornings.. Related Topics. Insurance. Public Health. Cancer. Health IT. Hospitals. Vaccines. Contact Us Submit a Story Tip