American Health Gets a Pink Slip
The Department of Health and Human Services underwent an unprecedented purge this week, as thousands of employees from the National Institutes of Health, the FDA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and other agencies were fired, placed on administrative leave, or offered transfers to far-flung Indian Health Service facilities. Altogether, the layoffs mean the federal government, in a single day, shed hundreds if not thousands of combined years of health and science expertise. Lauren Weber of The Washington Post, Rachel Cohrs Zhang of Bloomberg News, and Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet join Ńī¹óåś“«Ć½Ņīl Health Newsā Julie Rovner to discuss this enormous breaking story and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews Ńī¹óåś“«Ć½Ņīl Health Newsā Julie Appleby, who reported and wrote the latest āBill of the Monthā feature about a short-term health plan and a very expensive colonoscopy.