Why I Resigned

Public health has always been more than just a career for me—it is a mission to protect communities, prevent avoidable harm, and foster an environment where everyone has an opportunity to achieve their optimal health. My years in public health, including at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), were shaped by these values, as was my very difficult decision to resign from leading CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the end of August 2025. My resignation represented the culmination of severe ethical conflicts, malevolent policy actions, and a growing realization that the agency I served was being weaponized for ideological ends.

In this essay, I explore the reasons behind my departure, the ethical dilemmas I confronted, and the broader implications for public health, scientific integrity, and the future of public health and our nation’s health security. My hope is that my experience will serve as a call to action for those who share my commitment to science and to the health of the people public health serves.

My Commitment to Public Health

Throughout my career, I have been unwavering in my dedication to evidence-based medicine, community health, and the pursuit of equity. I trained to be an infectious disease doctor—a calling that brought me to public health. From testing people for HIV and sexually transmitted infections in nightlife venues to leading major national responses to outbreaks, to my work at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, at the White House, and at CDC, I have served in local and national public health for more than 20 years. Whether working on immunization strategies, fighting infectious diseases, or advocating for marginalized groups, my aims have always been to shield the most vulnerable and to provide a path for all people to achieve their optimal health.

CDC, for me, was not merely an institution—it functioned as a collective force for good, where science and compassion came together to shape policy and act with positive force to improve lives. But in 2025, CDC came under attack and was transformed into a self-serving weapon by the secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Thousands of staff were fired, core public health functions were ended, and CDC’s scientific voice was replaced by propaganda and ideology. The remaining CDC scientists, despite being dedicated public servants and true experts, are largely prevented from using science and their collective centuries of experience to interpret data or guide decision-makers.

CDC does not exist in a political vacuum. Neither does any public health issue. From gun violence to immigration, CDC has often found itself in the middle of discussions of complex political issues with occasional (and detrimental) politicization of its public health approach. This was most evident during the COVID-19 pandemic, which resulted in trust gaps with CDC that have facilitated the destruction of CDC’s public health mission at the hands of its current political leadership.

Resigning was not an impulsive act. It resulted from my long-standing concerns, diminishing ability to prevent harm, and deep conviction that remaining would compromise my values and my responsibility to the public. “First do no harm” was the oath I took to become a doctor, and I refuse to violate it. I and my colleagues Drs. Deb Houry and Dan Jernigan, global leaders in public health, decided that we would resign together to sound an alarm that could not be ignored. What is happening in public health now is not normal, and its impacts must be known by those public health is supposed to protect.¹

We had to raise a signal through the chaotic noise of Kennedy and his cronies to increase awareness. People’s lives and the health of the nation were—and are—at stake. Many of the observations and experiences that led to my resignation from CDC have continued to evolve and have brought us to the point where CDC and the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) can no longer be trusted² as credible sources of public health information—especially as it relates to vaccines, vaccine safety, and the vulnerable populations this administration vilifies.

Conflating Health Equity and “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion”

Until recently, CDC’s website defined health equity as the state in which everyone has a fair and just opportunity to attain their highest level of health and no one is disadvantaged from achieving this potential because of socioeconomic status or other socially determined circumstances.³ Science is a cornerstone of public health and is an essential part of multipronged efforts to achieve health equity. Science designed to generate knowledge that advances equity and reduces health disparities can improve population health and promote health for all members of society.⁴ In contrast, science and interventions not designed or implemented with equity in mind may inadvertently perpetuate or widen disparities.⁵ By conflating health equity and “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI), Kennedy and his team are attempting to erase decades of progress through doublespeak and purposeful misclassification of evidence-based interventions as “woke.” Are Americans going to tolerate this? Are we going to let an ideological battle against a distorted view of health equity hinder the progress we have made to end the epidemics of HIV, drug overdose, maternal mortality, and suicide among LGBTQIA+ youth? Are we going to replace evidence-based science with non-evidence-based and often discriminatory ideologies? Will our federal public health agencies support conversion therapy or involuntary commitment for people who use drugs? I fear that all this may happen—based on ideology and politics, not on science.

Health equity science provides a conceptual framework for scientific endeavors that are designed and conducted to advance health equity.⁶ Health equity science investigates patterns and underlying contributors to health inequities and builds an evidence base that can guide action across the domains of the public health program, surveillance, policy, communication, and scientific inquiry. Its goal is to move beyond simply documenting inequities toward eliminating them.

In contrast to health equity, DEI is a broader organizational and social approach that seeks to ensure diverse representation, equitable treatment, and inclusive environments across workplaces, educational institutions, and communities. DEI initiatives often focus on increasing participation from people of varied backgrounds and categories of identity (including race, gender, sexual orientation, ability, and more), removing barriers to opportunity, and fostering environments where all individuals feel respected and valued.

While health equity and DEI share the goals of fairness and justice, their scope and application differ. Health equity is specifically concerned with striving for equal opportunities for health by addressing the social determinants of health, driven by scientific research and public health action. DEI, meanwhile, encompasses a wider range of sectors and strives for fairness and inclusion in representation, access, and participation beyond just health outcomes. In public health, DEI principles may support health equity by promoting diverse voices and perspectives in decision-making, but health equity is uniquely focused on addressing the social determinants and systemic factors that shape health differences. Health equity is not just about race, gender, sexual orientation, or ability. It is about space and time—rural America and the inner city. It is about economics—access to healthy food, stable housing, adequate care, and more. It is about mitigating bias—creating more welcoming services in which patients are seen and heard. It is about health security—shoring up infrastructure to address everyday public health threats and rarer, more dangerous threats. And health equity is not about one agency or department, but about the core work of all public health.

By integrating equity-focused frameworks into scientific practice, public health efforts can more effectively fulfill their missions and actively work toward eliminating health disparities. As DEI is now being eliminated, temporarily suspended, or kept below the radar to survive authoritarian policies, the purposeful undoing of health equity reveals a disregard for the health of more vulnerable populations.

To decimate equity in public health is to endorse the philosophy that only the physically strong and socially advantaged deserve to thrive and survive. Strength and weakness are about not just the physical robustness of an individual or a population but also the context in which they live, work, play, and pray. It is the effort to build health-focused resilience within those contexts that supports access to the science-based interventions that allow people to achieve their optimal health. Decimating access to care, erasing populations (such as the Trump administration’s attempted erasure of transgender people by, for example, mandating the removal of demographic characteristics from disease surveillance), and downplaying the critical need for equity-focused public health reveal a system of eugenics that underpins the actions of Kennedy and his HHS.⁷ Supporting a system in which only the strong thrive and survive advances an “ideal” American society that is whiter, straighter, and wealthier than today’s actual US population. This system of eugenics is based on an unrealistic vision of health and inaccurate portrayals of national history, and it is the real mission behind the erasure of health equity as a central aim of public health.

Ethical Crossroads: When Science and Policy Diverge

As a public health professional and physician, I feel a deep moral responsibility to serve the greater good, protect the vulnerable, and defend the integrity of science against political manipulation. In the months before my resignation, I witnessed policies and leadership decisions made by Kennedy and his team that, in my judgment, diverged from these foundational principles.

I have always been willing to challenge dogma and question established thinking. But when the highest levels of leadership began treating public health as a political tool—using CDC to rubber-stamp policies that do not reflect scientific consensus—my ethical obligation became clear: I had to speak out and, if necessary, step away. I could not continue to lead in good conscience and participate in a system that undermined both science and public trust. Enough was enough.

Policy Concerns: Immunization Schedules and Exclusion of Expertise

One of my deepest concerns as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases was the overhaul of the COVID-19 immunization schedules in May 2025. These changes were made without transparency and are at odds with science that supports vaccinating pregnant people and healthy children under 24 months of age, placing the lives of our youngest and most vulnerable at risk.⁸ What troubled me most was that CDC was excluded from the decision-making process despite being the source of the accepted science on the topic.⁹ Our repeated requests for the data supporting these changes were denied. Instead, members of the press eventually sent us a “frequently asked questions” document that HHS had distributed to members of Congress without CDC’s awareness.¹⁰ This document referenced studies that Kennedy claimed supported his decisions, but the evidence was misrepresented—key findings were taken out of context or selectively cited in ways that contradicted the actual conclusions of the scientists involved.¹¹

Effective public health policy demands robust data, expert input, and transparent processes. When these are set aside in favor of political expediency, the consequences become real: disease, suffering, and loss of trust in preventive medicine. I could not in good faith support such a direction.

Leadership and Communication Failures: The Advisory Committee of Immunization Practices

Leadership in public health must be courageous, transparent, and collaborative. Instead, I observed major policy changes and personnel changes announced via social media and new advisory committee members appointed without proper vetting. For example, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices included 17 respected scientists who brought decades of pediatric, public health, and immunization experience to the table to guide national vaccine policy. They were terminated by HHS via a social media post and an op-ed¹² and were replaced by people with little or no qualifications beyond ideological alignment against vaccines¹³—these new members described themselves as “rookies”¹⁴ yet were empowered to make policy recommendations for our nation.

Meanwhile, the voices of those with decades of expertise—myself and my colleagues—were routinely sidelined. It became clear that HHS leadership was interested in appeasing political interests and following its own whims, not serving the public or respecting the processes that made CDC a global leader in public health and implementation science.¹⁵

This approach not only damaged morale within the agency but also eroded the credibility of CDC. When leadership chose ideology over expertise and bypassed established channels of communication that help maintain transparency and accountability, it endangered both the mission of CDC and the public it serves.

Impact on Vulnerable Communities

My career has been and remains devoted to protecting those most at risk. Under Kennedy’s leadership, I saw firsthand how policy shifts driven by ideology rather than science disproportionately harm children, pregnant people, and LGBTQIA+ individuals—especially transgender communities.¹⁶ The deliberate undermining of proven vaccination programs, the abandonment of critical HIV initiatives, and the termination of equity-driven research are not just policy failures; they are direct threats to lives and well-being. HHS has gone so far as to insert itself into the patient-clinician relationship, using fearmongering and scare tactics to prevent lifesaving gender-affirming care.

For decades, I have been a trusted advocate for LGBTQIA+ health; I could not be complicit in efforts to erase transgender populations or halt lifesaving research and programming. The fight for public health is inseparable from the fight for equity and justice.

Scientific Integrity: Why It Matters

Science is not an accessory to public health—it is foundational. Policies must be rooted in the best available evidence, shaped by open debate, and executed with transparency. When CDC subject-matter experts were excluded from key decisions and data were withheld, the result was policy by fiat, not science.

Kennedy himself stated that Americans should not take medical advice from him.¹⁷ In the climate that developed under his leadership, I was compelled to agree. Leadership that refuses to engage with scientific expertise cannot be trusted to provide accurate health guidance. I reject the trend toward touting “natural infection” and unproven remedies, and I reject the revival of the eugenic rhetoric that underlies the anti-science, anti-equity moment in which we live.¹⁸ Such ideas have no place in public health or medicine.

Personal Reflection: Family Legacy and the Cost of Silence

My grandfather, whose name I carry, stood up to fascism in Greece and lost his life for his convictions. I resigned to honor his legacy. Like my grandfather, I could not remain silent as I saw CDC weaponized to hurt the populations I had committed to serve. We medical professionals must not sit quietly as we see equity replaced with eugenics and authoritarian directives.

I also resigned to stand against the cowardice that now infects our leadership—a refusal to acknowledge how divisive rhetoric created an environment where violence became possible. The shooting attack on CDC on August 8, 2025, in which a police officer was killed, was motivated by the misinformation peddled by Kennedy and his colleagues. It was the cumulative effect of leadership that refused to take responsibility, even as the consequences of their choices became tragically clear. The ideological violence they waged on the agency and on public health was manifested in a physical attack, leaving CDC damaged and injured—and leaving three children without a father.¹⁹ In my view, Kennedy and his team only hastened their dismantling of CDC at the expense of our nation’s health.

Public health is not just about individual well-being; it encompasses the health of the entire community, the nation, and, indeed, the world. The reckless choices of those now in charge place our nation’s health security at risk. CDC’s mission—to save lives and protect health—cannot survive in an environment where scientific integrity is routinely sacrificed. The cost is being measured not only in trust but in lives lost and suffering unaddressed.

Since my resignation, I have seen many of the attacks on the health of the nation that I feared, and that led to my decision to leave federal service, grow in strength. The scientists and other civil servants who remain at CDC are being held hostage by Kennedy and his leadership team, who have hijacked the agency and continue to demonstrate their disregard for science and, more importantly, for its mission to protect health for all, not just some.²⁰ I took the risk to resign, but not all people at CDC have the luxury to do so. They have families and financial circumstances to consider, and some have made commitments that they are unable to walk away from.

The New CDC Manifesto: Partisan Ideology Supplants Public Health

On September 17, 2025, CDC revised its “About CDC” page, replacing the expression of its public health mission with a manifesto that confirmed my concern that ideology had supplanted science and best practice. CDC’s revised priorities emphasize a shift toward policies rooted in partisan stances rather than a broad, science-driven public health mission. The agency asserts it will insulate its recommendations from conflicts of interest but also deprioritize funding for programs that do not align with its expressed values, including those related to harm reduction, housing-first approaches, and DEI initiatives (which remain conflated with health equity).

In the area of social policy, CDC explicitly states it will not support programs perceived to encourage immigration by undocumented people, elective abortion, or gender-affirming care for minors, citing supposedly evidence-based (but in fact deeply flawed) reviews that question the safety and efficacy of such interventions. The agency’s stance on gender is rooted in a binary, “biological” definition that ignores the incredible sexual diversity of the natural world,²¹ and it commits to recognizing sex as immutable. Parental rights are also elevated, with CDC prioritizing transparency and “parental choice” in educational settings and promoting curricula without content that could conflict with a certain narrow set of personal beliefs—curricula that may intentionally fail to reflect scientific, historical, and social truths.²²

These ideological commitments diverge from CDC’s historic mission to protect the public’s health through unbiased science, inclusivity, and evidence-based interventions. By deprioritizing programs that address systemic inequities, support marginalized populations, and employ harm-reduction strategies, CDC’s new direction undermines its role as a trusted public health authority. The focus on ideology over scientific consensus and best practices is compromising the agency’s capacity to effectively safeguard the health of all Americans. This manifesto is not just rhetoric. It is being weaponized to cut key funding and programs that do not comport to these ideologies or that demonstrate dissent against HHS leadership, programs that serve many of the most vulnerable populations in the country.²³ This is not public health.

Science Replaced by Conspiracy: Vaccines and Autism

November 19, 2025, will be remembered as a very dark day in the history of public health in the United States. With the revision of its “Autism and Vaccines” page, CDC betrayed science, American families and children, and its own mission. Under the direction of Kennedy, CDC deleted the accepted scientific rationale that underpinned the statement that vaccines do not cause autism²⁴ and replaced it with decades-old, anti-vaccine distortions promoted by the secretary.

This shift from a clear, evidence-based stance that vaccines do not cause autism—supported by decades of research and global clinical consensus—to a message that introduces doubt and highlights unproven theories threatens the lives of millions of children. Most importantly, this distortion harms autistic children and preys upon their parents by both placing blame on them and offering false hope about a cause for autism that has no scientific justification. Parents want the best for their children—a fact that is being leveraged by the secretary for political gain. And these changes bypassed CDC’s scientific staff and peer review and created an official CDC source document for Kennedy and his colleagues to attack vaccines—likely for their own personal gain.²⁵

This hostile revision not only reframed settled science as uncertain but also undermined trust in CDC by circumventing established scientific processes. The updated page includes a prominent asterisked statement explaining why the heading “vaccines do not cause autism” was kept while the content of the page was rewritten to undermine that accepted truth.²⁶ This footnote clarified that the only reason this sentence remained on the page was that Kennedy had made a political agreement with a Senate leader to secure his confirmation as secretary. He lied to that leader and to the American public.

The destruction of the wall between ideology and public health science has destroyed the credibility of CDC and put clinicians in a position where official recommendations are no longer reliable. The broader consequence is increased public confusion, potential resurgence of preventable diseases, as we are seeing with measles,²⁷ and the deserved loss of trust in CDC and other federal public health agencies. If the secretary can so easily override scientific consensus and rewrite guidance to fit his ideology, the fundamental mission of CDC and federal public health has been irreparably damaged. Mistakes made in the COVID-19 pandemic in communications and transparency at all levels of government allowed for this transformation of CDC into a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Public health exists in a political system, but it should not be compromised by it.

The rewriting of CDC’s autism page is a cautionary signal about the dangers of bringing ideology and partisan politics into science and about the need for Congress to intervene to preserve evidence-based public health policy. With great sadness, I no longer believe that CDC can be regarded as a trusted source for health policy or guidance. It has been transformed into a propaganda machine that supports the personal, political, and financial aspirations of a scienceless leader and his allies.

A Call to Action

My decision to step down was not just a protest—it was a call to action. We need to restore transparency in decision-making about public health, hold leaders accountable, and recommit to the principles that built CDC’s reputation as a beacon of hope and progress. The health of our nation depends on professionals who will not compromise on integrity or science, and on institutions that are willing to defend the common good above all else.

We must be humble and acknowledge that the progress that ended the scourge of vaccine-preventable diseases, reversed the death sentence of HIV, and helped us begin to turn the corner on the opioid overdose epidemic included missteps and errors that brought us to this moment. We must not pine for a moment when the pendulum “swings back” to re-create the system that was so easy to destroy. Instead, we should listen to our past and present and work to create a new public health system more responsive to the ground, more focused on regional needs, and less academic and disconnected from the people it serves and the politicians who must work to co-create its implementation.

While we continue to witness the dismantling of public health, we health professionals must carry the water for our patients. We must drown out the distortions of partisan politics with clear statements of truth for the patients we care for and the systems we support. We must fight for health equity. We must defend, not erase, the most vulnerable. We must magnify science and debunk misinformation. Resistance is an act of love, not of hate, and we must counter mistruths without creating victims and martyrs.

When rationality returns to government, the actions we take today will become the blueprint for the future. We must be on the right side of history for the health of the nation and the world.

Demetre C. Daskalakis, MD, MPH, is the chief medical officer of Callen-Lorde Community Health Center in New York City and former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. He began his career as an attending physician at Bellevue Hospital in NYC, spearheading public health programs focused on community HIV testing and prevention; he was also the deputy commissioner for disease control for the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. 

Endnotes

1. D. Daskalakis, D. Jernigan, and D. Houry, “Read the Resignation Letters of Top CDC Officials,” MedPage Today, August 28, 2025, medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/publichealth/117197.

2. S. Chou et al., “The NIH Has Lost Its Scientific Integrity. So We Left,” STAT, January 10, 2026, statnews.com/2026/01/10/nih-resign-protest-four-leaders-cite-interference-censorship.

3. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “What Is Health Equity?,” June 11, 2024, web.archive.org/web/20250421083049/https://www.cdc.gov/health-equity/what-is/index.html (original link deleted by CDC); and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “About Health Equity,” February 5, 2024, cdc.gov/health-disparities-hiv-std-tb-hepatitis/about/index.html.

4. A. Penman-Aguilar et al., “Strategies for Reducing Health Disparities—Selected CDC-Sponsored Interventions, United States, 2016,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 65, no. 1 (2016): 1–72.

5. D. Mechanic, “Disadvantage, Inequality, and Social Policy,” Health Affairs 21, no. 2 (2002): 48–59.

6. R. Bunnell, J. Ryan, and C. Kent, “Toward a New Strategic Public Health Science for Policy, Practice, Impact, and Health Equity,” American Journal of Public Health 111, no. 8 (2021): 1489–96.

7. Office on Women’s Health, “Protecting Women and Children,” US Department of Health and Human Services, womenshealth.gov/protecting-women-and-children; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “CDC Priorities,” September 17, 2025, cdc.gov/about/cdc/index.html; and J. Frieden, “As MAHA Expands Its Reach, Some Critics Hear Echoes of the Eugenics Movement,” MedPage Today, November 26, 2025, medpagetoday.com/publichealthpolicy/healthpolicy/118753.

8. L. Schnirring, “AAP Evidence-Backed Immunization Schedule Reflects Break from CDC Advisers,” Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy, Research and Innovation Office, University of Minnesota, August 19, 2025, cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/aap-evidence-backed-immunization-schedule-reflects-break-cdc-advisers; and S. Soucheray, “Veering from CDC, ACOG Recommends Maternal Vaccination Against COVID-19,” Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy, Research and Innovation Office, University of Minnesota, August 25, 2025, cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/veering-cdc-acog-recommends-maternal-vaccination-against-covid-19.

9. E. McClymont et al., “The Role of Vaccination in Maternal and Perinatal Outcomes Associated with COVID-19 in Pregnancy,” JAMA 335, no. 2 (December 15, 2025): 154–62; and Frieden, “As MAHA Expands Its Reach.”

10. US Department of Health and Human Services, “COVID Recommendation FAQ,” cidrap.umn.edu/sites/default/files/searchable-download/COVID%20Vax%20FAQ_FINAL.pdf.

11. S. Gardner and L. Gardner, “HHS Justifies Decision to Stop Recommending COVID Shots During Pregnancy with Studies Supporting the Shots’ Safety,” Politico, June 10, 2025, politico.com/news/2025/06/10/hhs-justifies-decision-to-stop-recommending-covid-shots-during-pregnancy-with-studies-supporting-the-shots-safety-00396523; and K. Yandell, “HHS ‘FAQ’ Distorts Data on COVID-19 Vaccination During Childhood and Pregnancy,” FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, August 25, 2025, factcheck.org/2025/06/hhs-faq-distorts-data-on-covid-19-vaccination-during-childhood-and-pregnancy.

12. R. Kennedy, “HHS Moves to Restore Public Trust in Vaccines: We’re Reconstituting an Advisory Committee to Avoid Conflicts of Interest,” Wall Street Journal, June 9, 2025; and W. Stone, “RFK Jr. Boots All Members of the CDC’s Vaccine Advisory Committee,” National Public Radio, June 9, 2025, npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/06/09/nx-s1-5428533/rfk-jr-vaccine-advisory-committee-acip.

13. K. Dillinger and B. Goodman, “Five New Members Named to Influential CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee Days Ahead of Key Meeting,” CNN, September 15, 2025, edition.cnn.com/2025/09/15/health/cdc-acip-new-members.

14. J. Frieden, “They ‘Should Not Be Rookies’: Former CDC Officials Raise Concerns About New ACIP,” MedPage Today, September 22, 2025, medpagetoday.com/primarycare/vaccines/117591.

15. Kennedy, “HHS Moves.”

16. Office on Women’s Health, “Protecting Women and Children”; A. Mandavilli, “Trump Administration Ends Program Critical to Search for an H.I.V. Vaccine,” New York Times, June 23, 2025, nytimes.com/2025/05/30/health/trump-hiv-cuts.html; J. Michaud and J. Kates, “Tracking Key HHS Public Health Policy Actions Under the Trump Administration,” KFF, January 5, 2026, kff.org/other-health/tracking-key-hhs-public-health-policy-actions-under-the-trump-administration; and US Department of Health and Human Services, “HHS Acts to Bar Hospitals from Performing Sex-Rejecting Procedures on Children,” December 18, 2025, hhs.gov/press-room/hhs-acts-bar-hospitals-performing-sex-rejecting-procedures-children.html.

17. C. Cameron, “RFK Jr., the Health Secretary, Says Not to Take Medical Advice from Him,” New York Times, May 14, 2025, nytimes.com/2025/05/14/us/politics/rfk-jr-hhs-vaccines-medical-advice.html.

18. Frieden, “As MAHA Expands Its Reach.”

19. C. Kramon and J. Martin, “Shooter Attacked CDC Headquarters to Protest COVID-19 Vaccines, Authorities Say,” PBS News, August 12, 2025, pbs.org/newshour/nation/shooter-attacked-cdc-headquarters-to-protest-covid-19-vaccines-authorities-say; and G. Chidi, "Vaccine Misinformation Led to an Officer's Murder at the CDC - Politicians' Silence Is Deafening," The Guardian, August 27, 2025, theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/aug/27/atlanta-cdc-shooting-david-rose.

20. K. Butler, “‘Embarrassing’ and ‘Horrifying’: CDC Workers Describe the New Vaccines and Autism Page,” Mother Jones, November 21, 2025, motherjones.com/politics/2025/11/embarrassing-and-horrifying-cdc-workers-describe-the-new-vaccines-and-autism-page.

21. B. Swift, “What Sexual Diversity in the Natural World Can Teach Humans About Sex, Gender, and Inclusive Biology,” BioScience 74, no. 7 (July 2024): 424–29.

22. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “CDC Priorities.”

23. S. Stangland, “AAP Lawsuit Demands HHS Restore $12 Million in Grants; Calls Decision ‘Retaliation’ for Defense of Evidence-Based Care,” AAP News, American Academy of Pediatrics, December 24, 2025, publications.aap.org/aapnews/news/34072/AAP-lawsuit-demands-HHS-restore-12-million-in?searchresult=1?autologincheck=redirected.

24. World Health Organization, “WHO Expert Group’s New Analysis Reaffirms There Is No Link Between Vaccines and Autism,” December 11, 2025, who.int/news/item/11-12-2025-who-expert-group-s-new-analysis-reaffirms-there-is-no-link-between-vaccines-and-autism.

25. D. Daskalakis, D. Jernigan, and D. Houry, “CDC’s Vaccine Advisory Panel Faces a Crisis of Its Own Making,” STAT, December 3, 2025, statnews.com/2025/12/03/acip-meeting-cdc-vaccine-advisory-panel-risks-benefits; Office of Senator Elizabeth Warren, “At Hearing, Warren Slams RFK Jr. for Dangerous Conflicts of Interest, Profiting from Anti-Vaccine Conspiracies,” January 29, 2025, warren.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/at-hearing-warren-slams-rfk-jr-for-dangerous-conflicts-of-interest-profiting-from-anti-vaccine-conspiracies; and S. Lupkin, “RFK Jr. Plans to Keep a Financial Stake in Lawsuits Against the Drugmaker Merck,” National Public Radio, January 22, 2025, npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/01/22/nx-s1-5271582/rfk-hpv-vaccine-merck.

26. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Autism and Vaccines,” November 19, 2025, cdc.gov/vaccine-safety/about/autism.html.

27. R. Schmerling, “Measles Is Making a Comeback: Can We Stop It?,” Harvard Health Publishing, January 6, 2026, health.harvard.edu/blog/measles-is-making-a-comeback-can-we-stop-it-202503063091.

[Illustrations by Yasmine Gateau]