Trump Administration hits 'pause' on public health messages

Trump Administration hits 'pause' on public health messages. No news might not be good news during the reported shutdown, critics say. Image via HHS

No news might not be good news during the reported shutdown

Noticing fewer health alerts from government agencies lately? That may be because of a government-issued pause in official health alerts.

The Trump Administration issued the pause on a variety of health communications going out from some of the nation’s top health and science agencies, according to reporting from The Washington Post.

The pause may in part be driven by the process of installing new appointees for senior management positions at departments such as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). 

“HHS has issued a pause on mass communications and public appearances that are not directly related to emergencies or critical to preserving health,” a spokesperson from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed in an email to ConsumerAffairs. “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 the HHS divisions believe are mission critical, but they will be made on a case-by-case basis.” 

"A dark harbinger"

The Center For Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) said the pause "will stifle the speech of government science and scientists, and is very likely a dark harbinger of what’s to come from this administration."

Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group, also expressed its concerns about the pause.

“There is zero reason for standard public health communications that people rely on to stay safe to be paused, and for scientific meetings to be postponed or cancelled,” according to a statement released by Public Citizen on January 23. “The public needs and should expect a seamless transition between administrations for the timely communication of all essential public health information. A pause in these vital communications should never have happened and must fully end by February 1.”

In a memo the AP obtained, Dorothy Fink, acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) discussed with her staff leaders an “immediate pause” that the Trump administration had enacted on guidance, regulations, press releases, announcements, and social media posts — in addition to other communications — until they could be approved by a political appointee. The pause would be in effect until the end of the month, according to the memo, the AP reported.

HHS oversees the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the CDC and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and presumably communications from all those agencies are impacted by the pause. 

Which publications are affected?

A CDC spokesperson who responded to ConsumerAffairs initially did not respond to a follow-up question about which CDC publications are impacted by the pause. 

However, according to reporting from The Washington Post, the public messaging interruption also applies to the scientific publication of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) — Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) — as well as what is published in the Federal Register, the official daily publication for notices, rules and proposed rules of federal agencies as well as presidential documents such as executive orders.

This pause may be an opportunity for a strategic look at federal agency messaging to better engage people and protect health for everyone in our communities,” Dr. Ali Khan, former CDC outbreak investigator who currently works as dean of the University of Nebraska’s public health college, said in an email.

Khan added that the Trump administration is “very adept” at communicating with the American public and one of the criticisms of the COVID response was the “mismatch” between CDC and FDA messages to the public “and how those messages were delivered and interpreted.”

“The only concern would be if this was a prelude to a repeat of another major reason for the failed COVID response — disinformation,” he said.

Khan said that he was concerned about “manipulation of scientific communiques for partisan purposes.”

The Washington Post was the first to report the pause. A reporter from the publication spoke with close to 12 current and former officials and others familiar with the matter, at least some of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity.

ConsumerAffairs contacted a spokesperson for the FDA who directed us to contact HHS, however HHS did not respond to a request for comment and neither did NIH.

ConsumerAffairs was unable to contact the Office of Public & Media Affairs at The White House because the website is not currently operational (“Page not found”).