Trouble at the CDC?

Anonymous letters to The Lancet point to problems with the CDC's Center for Global Health, but the agency denies the allegations.

Written byBob Grant

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WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, DANIEL MAYER

Three anonymous letters detailing alleged problems at a global health division run by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provoked a rebuttal from CDC officials.

Allegations in the letters, excerpts of which were published in The Lancet within the last month and aimed at the CDC's 18-month-old Center for Global Health, range from general low morale amongst staffers at the center to misappropriation of funds and clashing with the US Agency for International Development programs. One of the three letters calls for an "objective evaluation" of the global health division, and the other two propose that a Congressional investigation be initiated.

The Lancet editor, Richard Horton, is defending the journal's publication of the letters, saying they are exhortations from CDC staffers whose concerns ...

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Meet the Author

Bob Grant
From 2017 to 2022, Bob Grant was Editor in Chief of The Scientist, where he started in 2007 as a Staff Writer. Before joining the team, he worked as a reporter at Audubon and earned a master’s degree in science journalism from New York University. In his previous life, he pursued a career in science, getting a bachelor’s degree in wildlife biology from Montana State University and a master’s degree in marine biology from the College of Charleston in South Carolina. Bob edited Reading Frames and other sections of the magazine.
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