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The federal government is cutting 3,500 full-time FDA employees and 1,200 NIH workers as part of an overarching move designed to eliminate 10,000 jobs in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
The layoffs are supposed to save the agency $1.8 billion annually, HHS said in a Thursday morning press release.
For the FDA, the workforce reduction “will not affect drug, medical device or food reviewers, nor will it impact inspectors,” as the food and drug agency will “focus on streamlining operations and centralizing administrative functions,” according to an HHS fact sheet.
Meanwhile, the NIH will slash its workforce by about 1,200 people “by centralizing procurement, human resources and communications across its 27 institutes,” according to the HHS fact sheet.
The new restructuring, on top of early retirements and the administration’s previous downsizing efforts, will bring the entire health department’s current size of 82,000 full-time staffers down to 62,000, according to a from the HHS. The government also plans to consolidate the department’s 28 divisions into 15 while downsizing 10 regional offices into five.
The HHS layoffs and reorganization align with President Donald Trump’s executive order, “Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Workforce Optimization Initiative.”
Also included in the cuts are 2,400 CDC workers—1,000 of which come from the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR)—as the Trump administration focuses on “returning” to the agency’s “core mission of preparing for and responding to epidemics and outbreaks.”
The administration has moved ASPR under the CDC umbrella as part of the reorganization. The unit is designed to help prevent, prepare for and respond to adverse health effects tied to public health emergencies and disasters.
Three hundred CMS workers will also be laid off.
“No additional cuts are currently planned, but the department will continue to look for further ways to streamline its operations and agencies,” the HHS said in the media release.
In a March 27 post on X, HHS head Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the administration “will eliminate an entire alphabet soup of departments, while preserving their core functions by merging them into a new organization called the Administration for a Healthy America or AHA.”
The HHS will prioritize “ending America’s epidemic of chronic illness by focusing on safe, wholesome food, clean water, and the elimination of environmental toxins,” according to the public release.
The layoffs are in addition to earlier federal workforce reductions made by the Trump administration plus cuts to research funding and agency sites.
During the firing of probationary employees earlier this year, in tandem with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) spearheaded by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, federal workers were fired and promptly asked to return. These terminations are currently halted as they make their through the court system, with many on administrative leave as they wait for more clarification from supervisors and judges.