CDC eliminates infectious disease advisory panel

CDC has eliminated HICPAC, according to four committee members who spoke to NBC News and said they learned about HICPAC's termination on Friday.

A letter reviewed by NBC News said HICPAC's termination occurred on March 31 and aligns with President Donald Trump's executive order calling for a reduction of the federal workforce.

HICPAC developed national standards for handwashing, mask-wearing, and isolating sick patients that most U.S. hospitals follow. Since HICPAC was created over 30 years ago, it has made 540 recommendations to CDC, 90% of which were fully implemented.

Several of HICPAC's web pages have been archived, meaning they're available to view online but aren't being updated. Some committee members said they're concerned HICPAC's guidelines will be frozen and unable to evolve with new scientific research.

"At some point, when things need to change, the guidelines likely won't change, and then people will be sort of flying by the seat of their pants," said Connie Steed, HICPAC member since 2023 and former president of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology.

Anurag Malani, a fellow at the Infectious Diseases Society of America who joined HICPAC in January, said the committee was close to finalizing new guidelines on airborne pathogens — which haven't been updated since 2007 — before it was terminated.

"There was really a lot of important material in there and, I think, a lot of lessons learned from COVID that helped shape those guidelines to put us in a better place than we were pre-pandemic," Malani said.

"While we had significant concerns regarding HICPAC's make up and proposed guidance, the termination of the committee removes important public transparency," said Jane Thomason, lead hygienist at National Nurses United. "Without HICPAC's public meetings, there is no longer any public access to the process for drafting CDC guidance on infection control for healthcare settings. This further undermines safety for patients, nurses, and other healthcare workers."

(Bendix, NBC News, 5/7)

Trump signs executive order aimed at speeding up building of new drug factories

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order instructing FDA to streamline regulations on new American drug manufacturing facilities to speed up their completion and increase domestic supply.

The order also looks to increase inspections of overseas manufacturing plants supplying the U.S. market. These inspections will be funded by increased fees "to the extent consistent with applicable law." FDA will disclose the annual number of overseas inspections by country and manufacturer.

Alex Schriver, SVP of public affairs at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said in a statement that the executive order was a "welcome step toward supporting the hundreds of billions of dollars in new U.S. investments."

However, Schriver added that "[i]mposing tariffs on medicines or adopting foreign price setting policies would result in less U.S. investment and weaken U.S. leadership at a time when we are facing growing competition from China," referencing Trump's executive order on lowering drug prices and his comments regarding imposing tariffs on pharmaceutical imports.

(Gardner, BioPharma Dive, 5/6)

Federal judge pauses downsizing of federal workforce

Federal Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco on Friday issued an emergency order in a lawsuit filed two weeks ago by labor unions and cities challenging President Donald Trump's efforts to shrink the size of the federal government. Illston's order would halt the majority of the government's downsizing.

"The Court holds the President likely must request Congressional cooperation to order the changes he seeks, and thus issues a temporary restraining order to pause large-scale reductions in force in the meantime," Illston wrote.

The order directs multiple federal agencies to halt acting on Trump's workforce executive order signed in February, and the subsequent memo issued by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

The order doesn't require departments to rehire people and expires in 14 days. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit asked that the effective date of any agency action be postponed and that departments cease implementing or enforcing the executive order. The request was limited to departments where downsizing is already underway, including HHS.

Illston said that the president has the authority to seek changes within executive branch departments and agencies created by Congress, "[b]ut he must do so in lawful ways. He must do so with the cooperation of Congress, the Constitution is structured that way."

In the lawsuit, lawyers for the government argued that the executive order and memo only provided general principles that agencies should follow in exercising their own decision-making process.

"[The memo] expressly invites comments and proposals for legislative engagement as part of policies that those agencies wish to implement," said Eric Hamilton, a deputy assistant attorney general. "It is setting out guidance."

However, Danielle Leonard, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said it was clear that President Trump, DOGE, and OPM were making decisions outside of their authority and weren't inviting feedback from agencies.

"They are not waiting for these planning documents" to go through long processes, Leonard said. "They're not asking for approval, and they're not waiting for it."

(Har, Associated Press, 5/9)

Trump signs executive order eliminating funding for 'gain-of-function' research

Last week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order eliminating federal funding for so-called "gain-of-function" research, where researchers experiment with viruses and other pathogens that have the potential to trigger a pandemic. The field has long been controversial due to fears that scientists could make a more dangerous pathogen in their lab that could escape and lead to a pandemic.

The order would end support for gain-of-function research that was deemed dangerous or was conducted in countries of concern, including China, and would impose new constraints on research within the United States. The pause in funding will be in place "until a safer, more enforceable, and transparent policy governing such research can be developed and implemented," the White House said.

Any researchers found to be violating the policy could face a five-year cutoff from all federal life-sciences grants.

Trump and other elected officials have linked gain-of-function research to the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, claiming that researchers at a lab in Wuhan, China, produced the coronavirus. At the signing of the executive order, Trump reiterated his belief in the connection.

"I think I said that from Day 1, that it leaked out," he said. "A scientist walked outside to have lunch with a girlfriend or was together with a lot of people."

Multiple published studies point to a market in Wuhan as the origin of the pandemic, arguing that evidence strongly suggests that wild mammals picked up a bat coronavirus and that when the animals were sold at the market, they passed the virus onto people.

However, American intelligence agencies are divided in their assessments, with the Department of Energy, CIA, and FBI endorsing the idea the pandemic originated in the Wuhan lab, though the Department of Energy and CIA said they had "low confidence" in their assessment. Meanwhile, the National Intelligence Council and four other intelligence bodies said they favored the idea that the pandemic had natural origins.

(Reed, Axios, 5/5; Zimmer/Anthes, New York Times, 5/5; Stein, "Shots," NPR, 5/5)