The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been alerting the nation about health threats much less frequently since President Trump returned to office, raising concerns among doctors and public health authorities.
The CDC issued just six alerts from the agency's Health Alert Network in 2025. The number of these HANs, as the alerts are known, varies from year to year. But the agency typically issues many more – sometimes dozens.
"We're absolutely flying blind," says Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association. "We're blind to a whole range of health risks that are entering our community or re-emerging in our community."
The drop in alerts leaves doctors, hospitals and health departments less prepared and more vulnerable to getting blindsided, Benjamin and others say.
"HANs are a really important tool," says Lauren Sauer, associate director of the Global Center for Health Security at the University of Nebraska. "They tell clinicians: Here's what you need to think about as you're screening patients, or diseases that you might not be expecting to see, walking through your emergency department. Clinicians need tools like that to say, 'Pay attention to this specific thing right now.' "
Past alerts have sounded the alarm about a wide variety of threats, including Ebola, bird flu and the coronavirus pandemic.
"It's our early-warning system," Benjamin says. "It's the weatherman of public health. It gives us enormous situational awareness."
Beyond alerting doctors, nurses and other medical providers, the advisories also spur hospitals to stock up on the right medications and supplies and make sure they're adequately staffed. The alerts also prime health departments to be on the lookout for unusual disease clusters.
"It's another pillar of preparedness and response," says Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, who runs Boston University's Center on Emerging Diseases.
The CDC didn't issue a HAN about this season's flu, even though a mutated strain emerged to drive what looks like one of the worst in years. The agency hasn't sent a HAN about measles since March even though the current outbreak in South Carolina is one of the worst in decades and the nation may be on the verge of losing its measles elimination status. CDC never issued a HAN about recent outbreaks of whooping cough.
"The silence is deafening," Benjamin says.
Critics like Benjamin say the trickle of HANs is indicative of the muzzling of the CDC. The agency has also been publishing fewer reports in its flagship publication the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, canceled a campaign to encourage flu vaccination, paused updating critical databases and rarely briefs reporters.
"Unfortunately, I think this is very emblematic of a decline in the communications, both in the amount as well as the quality," says Dr. Debra Houry, who resigned as the CDC's chief medical officer in August because of the Trump administration's policies.
She says the agency has been hollowed out by mass firings and is now controlled by political appointees instead of scientists.
The CDC did not respond to NPR's questions about the number of HANs. In an email to NPR, Andrew Nixon, a spokesman at the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees CDC, called claims the agency had pulled back "false."
"CDC continues to alert the public about urgent public health incidents and works closely with federal, state, territorial, tribal and local partners to develop response protocols and maintain strong stakeholder relationships," Nixon wrote.
Still, outside organizations are trying to fill the void.
"One of the silver linings is that there are other models being tried. For example, we're seeing a lot of regional consortiums where states are getting together to see what they can do for public health," says Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University who has started a newsletter called FOI Clinical. "There's an appetite for more relevant and more higher-volume communication."
Copyright 2026 NPR
