CDC lays off 1,300 staff amid shutdown; hundreds notices reversed

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notified roughly 1,300 employees on Friday that they would be laid off as part of a broader government workforce reduction tied to the federal shutdown, and agency officials scrambled over the weekend to rescind hundreds of those notices after acknowledging some were issued in error. The actions affected personnel involved in outbreak response, scientific publication and vaccine surveillance at the agency headquartered in Atlanta.

Agency and health department officials said the initial reduction notices were part of a wider across-government effort tied to the shutdown and intended to remove positions designated as nonessential. A senior federal health official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that hundreds of termination emails were reversed within hours on Saturday after managers identified misclassifications; however, about 400 CDC staff were still reported to have active layoff notices by the end of the weekend.

The workforce reductions temporarily targeted units responsible for the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the agency’s flagship epidemiological publication, the National Center for Immunization and...