Thousands of Department of Health and Human Services employees responsible for researching diseases, inspecting food for safety, and operating Medicare and Medicaid have been offered buyouts. The staff members have until March 14 to decide whether to resign in exchange for a payment of $25,000, CBS News reports. The unsigned email offer was sent Friday night to most of the agency's 80,000 workers, per the AP, including employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institutes of Health, and Food and Drug Administration.
HHS has a budget of about $1.7 trillion, most of which goes toward health care for Americans through Medicare and Medicaid. Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said last month on Fox News that he has a "generic list" of employees he wants out, per NBC News. "If you've been involved in good science, you have got nothing to worry about," Kennedy said. "If you care about public health, you've got nothing to worry about. If you're in there working for the pharmaceutical industry, then I'd say you should move out and work for the pharmaceutical industry."
It's not clear how cutting the workforce will affect HHS' handling of such pressing problems as the avian flu and measles outbreaks. The Voluntary Separation Incentive Payment Authority permits federal agencies that are cutting staff or restructuring to offer lump-sum payments of as much as $25,000 as an incentive to leave. President Trump told Cabinet members last week that if they don't cut their departments enough, Elon Musk will do it for them. (More Health and Human Services stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
