25 Comments

Is anyone starting a lawsuit for exceeding his authority? We're going to spend the next several years in court anyway, but I would think this one would deserve a temporary injunction for overriding the Public Health Service Act.

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I'm sure they are

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Lawrence Gostin and Richard Conniff appeared on the PBS Newshour yesterday. I sent them an email saying this:

I am a political activist who is well-known by politicians and members of the news media.

What do you plan to do about Trump? Mr. Gostin: Do you plan to sue him? His actions are so injurious to us, I don't think they could possibly be construed as official acts, and therefore, he could be prosecuted. Damaging our public health also damages our national security.

Alternatively, you could say Trump is insane. Just because he's angry at China, he wants to hurt every country in the world, including us?

My preference would be to invoke the 25th Amendment. Clearly, he is unfit for office. The 25th Amendment would be the quickest and most comprehensive way to get rid of him.

What are your thoughts on the subject? Thank you.

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Grand Rounds scheduled for today at my hospital was canceled.

I received this e-mail today:

I regret to inform you that today's grand rounds on “Update on the Research and Management of Treatment-resistant Depression” is being cancelled and will be rescheduled. We were looking forward to an exciting grand rounds but I have just been informed that there has been a presidential order prohibiting all presentations by NIMH staff until February 1, 2025. Therefore, today's grand rounds cannot be held until the new policies have been implemented. I apologize for the inconvenience and the last-minute cancellation. We will be rescheduling the grand rounds sometime in the future. Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions.

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Crazy. I wish you'd sent me that earlier!!!

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I had difficulty believing it.

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Thanks, I hate it.

I'm so grateful for you and others like you. I hope you know how much you are appreciated. It is a terrifying time. And it's Day 3. God help us.

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2 of my adult kids fled the LA wildfires ~ and a lot of their peers ~ example / people need to know public health air quality / dust and ash advisories immediately / when it’s safe to go outside and when it’s not with emergency air pollution and masks 😷 for wildfires / when drinking water is safe … when its a boil water advisory etc it’s lots of environmental public health info for natural disasters around the country ~ also tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, derechos, ice storms anything ~ climate disasters ~ communicating all sorts of public health and safety announcements not even just us simply and majorly worrying about bird flu probabilities and incidence ( which is so relevant : bird flu is risk happening now on farms and in yards / we need to know the data on dairy / milk / cows / chickens : how to stay safe in backyards etc and to put it plainly/ how to know symptoms etc awareness ..even keeping wildlife and pets monitored for bird flu risks and prevalence….

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I was forwarded an email that said "The National Vaccine Advisory Committee meeting scheduled for February 20-21 has been cancelled." I checked the website and only past meetings are showing. Nothing is scheduled. They meet regularly three times a year and the first meeting is in February.

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In 2021 my daughter was 22 years old and worked at Target and wore a mask 😷. Her coworkers wore masks too. One night her friend went out after work and didn’t wear a mask, she contracted covid and died within two weeks from covid. It was shocking. She was young and full of hopes and dreams like my daughter. My daughter a vocalist, she has gotten covid now 3x and has long covid. She has paused work and performing since her 3 rd covid infection. We need societal public health info as it unfolds~ daily public health transparency for our families, kids, teens, young adults and young vulnerable workers … in the covid pandemic 😷 it was essential to get info to keep essential workers safe. We need info for our families who work public facing jobs and often long shifts~ or overtime … need science facts- no censorship. Public health infrastructure and the communication of info to our teens and twenty year olds is absolutely essential. Our children and youth deserve timely public health info just like during covid and flu periods or other epidemics ( or info on vaping etc the risks ) / they need facts to stay safe from so many civilization ailments and increasing environmental hazards. They need info on basic reproductive health and evolving and fluctuating STDs in society in their twenties, even late teens, thirties, forties ~ they need to know the relevant data, research to be knowledgeable to make smart and wise decisions and daily choices. This is really for all of us as vulnerable human organisms! Science incoming data and analysis is utterly relevant and our foundation to life and development, evolution…We all need to contact our Congress people~ communicate … also about our teens in society who may be using they/them pronouns / they need to be protected within the public health sphere ~ let’s all advocate for our families’ freedoms and basic health universal human rights …our children need a functioning health care system to rely on and public health functioning (obviously and youth don’t need added stress or anxiety from healthcare insecurity or ambiguity, roller coaster confusion ~yeah these policies and freezes are a violation of human rights and family health dignity ( equal access to care and health knowledge for all citizens and ages ~ access to latest info and research news etc )

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Thank you and to all public health officials, scientists and doctors who put health and safety first each day. There is so much that I just can't understand right now and truly hope that we can get back on track and that it is not going to be as bad as I fear. We must figure out a way to do better but it is going to take the people in the majority to do what they know to be right even if it means going against a certain someone.

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Is this post shareable to non-paying subscribers?

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Should be!

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Thank you! We need to create more awareness of this self-made crisis.

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What I do is this (I have an iPhone): I got the post in my Gmail. I click the 3 dots, which lets me Print. Then I save the .pdf in my File Browser app. I redact my email address using my PDF Expert app. I go to the I Love PDF website to extract the pages I want. I then copy this .pdf file to Google Drive. I create a file link which I can then post on Facebook or Bluesky, or anywhere else. I know that sounds like a lot. I tried opening the post directly from here to my Brave browser, but the text was cut off. Also, if you try something like that, remember to sign into Substack again when you are in the browser, or you will get a solicitation to subscribe.

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Thanks!

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Dan Diamond of the Washington post would like to hear from anyone impacted by the pause: dan.diamond@washpost.com

The NIH has rescinded job offers. Whatever you feel about The Washington Post, they did break this story.

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The Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy may not have been "gutted", but according to Time magazine (17 January 2025), "The political appointees in charge of the office—director Paul Friedrichs and deputy director Nikki Romanik—are leaving to make way for potential Trump appointments, and several of the office’s 14 career staffers, whose assignments to the White House office were temporary, are returning to their home agencies." And the links to pages on the White House web site dealing with the office now return a "404 not found" error. DT did this in his first go-round; no surprise that he's doing it again.

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Ugh, this saddens me. Thank you for doing what you do. Please know we appreciate you and appreciate you keeping us informed.

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This is no surprise to anyone who paid attention to Project 2025. The DTs (the orange maggot and his lackeys, those who prepare the actual orders) are out to rid the federal government of anyone who doesn't toe the line (and intimidate and prosecute those in local government who don't help them). The good people at CDC and FDA and elsewhere - those who pay attention to science and care about public health (i.e. care about people) - are likely to be removed as soon as they speak up. Local public health officials, many under siege since 2021, are being targeted already (anecdotal evidence, but surely some news media will soon be reporting). Many of the early edicts (aka "executive orders") will have long-term consequences for many people, even those not directly targeted, and even if some are eventually overturned through litigation. The cost in time and money to achieve resolution in the courts will be enormous - and the associated mental health costs will constitute a huge public health crisis. Opposition and resistance are the only options at this point. As Robert Hubbell just posted: "There is no normalizing Trump. Those who do are complicit in his depravity."

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Serious question (I am an anti-Trump Democrat). Would a truly objective person judge that in the past five years the CDC and NIH have allowed political bias to creep into their work that was in any way detrimental to our nation?

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It goes like this. Science used to be seen as non-partisan. Now settled science is seen as some kind of Leftist project. So if these organizations value and adhere to science, they are seen by some as inherently political or biased. Isn't that sad?

That said, there are always biases to be confronted. The CDC in particular has a LOT of rules on political stuff that actually ties their hands. For example, they can't assess whether legal policies have an effect on health or mortality, lest that be interpreted as partisan. My experience with the CDC is that the rank and file experts live in fear of being seen as too political and are actually *too careful*. At the top, though? Yeah the Director position is subject to bias. They are appointed by the President, so...yeah.

NIH I'm less sure about.

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Thanks for responding. I'm still focused on the CDC's and many blue city and state public health officials' incorrect response to Covid. Many flat out errors starting with a seeming misunderstanding on transmission which, to even this liberal arts major, is rather obvious based on how respiratory viruses work. People were wiping their mail and their groceries into summer. Remember no masks and then masks of any kind? It even took way too long to recognize that dementia was a revealing variable which seemed obvious from reading the obits in the spring of 2020. There were countless obvious scientific errors which always seemed to result from emphasizing equity. Great example was a a NYT story on the impact of Covid due to unhealthy air in low income areas which utilized Chelsea's death rate as an example when Chelsea's high death rate at that early stage was in fact due to there being a Soldier's Home there. There was the silence about gatherings post-George Floyd after telling everyone to stay away from others with playgrounds and basketball courts still shut in cities like Boston. My daughter had to run cross country in the fall of 2020 in a mask when each runner started separately like a time trial. And then they still canceled it mid-season. I could go on and on with the errors that all seemed to track with partisan politics.

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Perhaps it is time for those in the private sectors to take the reins on much of this (obviously not the NIH and all related funding. But the tracking of data, the assembly of key individuals from academia as well as industry with a view to consensus building about what to track, what to report, what actions to take etc... AND most importantly, the development of data analytics and tools that ANYONE can support this. Our public health should not be a political hot potato.

I believe there are MANY more of us who want to cooperate for the greater good, than those who do not. I also think sometimes a challenge like this forces all of us to collaborate, build consensus and build a better way forward. I am sure those in government want to do what's best, but if their hands are tied (They are), then we need to step in a fill the void

What do others say?

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Also, I would rather spend the funds you would use for a law suit, to hire fresh talent from all those universities, healthcare systems, and corporations and put them to work to find the next generation of Public health tracking, reporting, predicting etc.

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