WASHINGTON — The Trump administration terminated employees at the Food and Drug Administration on Saturday night, three sources told STAT.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many FDA employees were affected, nor how many parts of the agency may be involved. Some of those cut worked in the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, one of the people said.
The layoffs are part of a purge of probationary employees that started Friday, and included staff at the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Senior officials were told that 5,200 probationary employees were to be let go across the Department of Health and Human Services, which includes the FDA, NIH, and CDC.
Trump administration to fire thousands at health agencies
Around 1,300 workers at CDC were set to be impacted. A number of contract workers at CDC and across HHS have also lost their jobs over the past few weeks.
The administration, aided by Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service, has aggressively trimmed the federal workforce since Trump’s inauguration last month. Federal workers have been encouraged to leave via a buyout offer, return-to-work order, and the threat of limited legal protections.
President Trump’s nominee to run the FDA, Marty Makary, has not yet been confirmed by the Senate. Sara Brenner is the agency’s acting commissioner.
Two outside sources also reported on social media that cuts were hitting the FDA late Saturday. Marisa Kabas, an independent journalist, posted on Bluesky that she had reviewed an email sent to probationary employees who were eliminated. Alexander Gaffney, an analyst at Politico’s AgencyIQ research arm, posted on X that staff cuts were hitting the agency.
CDC cuts expected to devastate Epidemic Intelligence Service, a ‘crown jewel’ of public health
An FDA spokesperson did not respond to a text and an email requesting comment.
The FDA employs almost 20,000 people, and FDA-regulated products including foods, medicines, and medical products account for 20 cents of every dollar spent by American consumers.
Investors in biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and medical device companies have been particularly focused on employees partially paid by “user fees,” which are fees paid by regulated companies that fund the review of their products. The fear is that if these employees are cut, it would mean that review times for drugs and other medical products could slow. That, in turn, could have an immediate impact on the stock prices of pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device companies.
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