from Hacker News

Trump administration to fire thousands at health agencies

by frigidwalnut on 2/14/25, 5:48 PM with 47 comments

• by avgDev on 2/14/25, 6:03 PM

  What is happening at these agencies is absolutely crazy. National parks are understaffed and worried about the upcoming season.

  It seems the admin just wants to gut everything, and the only reason to me seems privatization. Make all these agencies dysfunctional, tell people look how bad<insert govt. agency here> is, let's get bids from private companies that can do a better job at <x> dollars.

  I hope this is not the case.

• by andyjohnson0 on 2/14/25, 6:08 PM

  Looks like its not just health-related agencies. Many/most people hired by US government agencies in the last two years seem to be being let-go. Some of them will be tech workers, but also engineers, scientists, clinicians, administrators, rangers, educators. People who use this site.

  "Some 280,000 employees out of the 2.3 million member civilian federal workforce were hired in the last two years, with most still on probation and easier to fire, according to government data."

  "About 1,200 to 2,000 workers at the Department of Energy were laid off, including hundreds of employees from the office that oversees the nuclear stockpile, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday."

  https://www.reuters.com/world/us/thousands-fired-trump-musk-...

  Looks like absolute carnage, and its hard to see how the US government is going to maintain its operational capacity. As for the CDC being gutted, better hope these bird flu and measles outbreaks don't do a covid.

• by insane_dreamer on 2/15/25, 4:53 PM

  We're damaging our future, for what?

  > One high-level researcher who spoke on the condition of anonymity said that the NIH has effectively shut down a highly competitive intramural research program for undergraduate degree holders before they start graduate or medical school. It’s responsible for the next generation of leaders in biomedical sciences, the researcher said: “These are the best and the brightest to get their training and become world class scientists to compete with China.” The program had about 1,600 people in it last year; more than 1,000 positions will not be filled, the person said.

• by bloopernova on 2/14/25, 6:13 PM

  Could someone with an economics background comment on what effects may occur after having a quarter million people out of work at the same time?

• by silexia on 2/14/25, 9:11 PM

  We need to change the laws making it difficult to fire federal employees, so that we can fire low performers instead of just based on seniority. Previous corrupt laws were passed to only allow firing junior employees, not senior. So this is the only way to shrink the federal government at this point.

  Make the federal government accountable and allow terminations based on performance.

• by softwaredoug on 2/14/25, 6:17 PM

  What’s hard to tell in all this:

  What is likely illegal vs what is actually the presidents prerogative? Or is it all a test to find that boundary?

• by insane_dreamer on 2/15/25, 4:56 PM

  Most people aren't aware of ARPA-H but the research it funds is important and potentially highly impactful. It takes a DARPA approach of funding "moonshot" type research in the domain of medicine/health. These are projects that are normally very hard to fund because they are trying to solve hard problems rather than result in some immediate commercial application. But a necessary part of the hard science that lays the foundation for future technological breakthroughs. Very sad to see this laid to wasted by some idiots.

  > Head of ARPA-H and Biden appointee Renee Wegrzyn told staff Friday morning that she was fired, a source told STAT. The agency, established in 2022 by Biden to work with the private sector on breakthrough medical technology, employs less than 200 workers. Because of the agency’s newness, most employees are considered probationary and could be targeted for layoffs.

• by stcroixx on 2/14/25, 6:19 PM

  Well, we're pretty unhealthy. These agencies don't seem to have been very successful at making us healthy. Probably time to try another approach.

• by outside1234 on 2/14/25, 6:00 PM

  Cue the measles outbreak in 3... 2...!

• by thecopy on 2/14/25, 6:02 PM

  Everything Musk et. al. is doing seems to me to be the analog of a junior developer joining and wanting to rewrite everything.