HHS to cut 10,000 jobs as part of major agency overhaul

The US Health and Human Services Department (HHS) announced last week that it will eliminate 10,000 full-time positions in multiple health agencies.

The move will shrink the department’s staff from 82,000 workers to 62,000, after 10,000 employees resigned voluntarily, CNN reported.

Major changes in Health Department

As part of this restructuring, HHS intends to roll its divisions from 28 into 15. One of the key new additions will be the Administration for a Healthy America, designed to fight America’s chronic health problems. Regional offices will decrease from 10 to 5 in order to save $1.8 billion per year.

“We aren’t just reducing bureaucratic sprawl. We are realigning the organisation with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic,” said Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of HHS. “This Department will do more—a lot more—at a lower cost to the taxpayer.”

While these reductions were being made, HHS assured citizens that critical programs such as Medicare and Medicaid would remain unaffected by the revisions.

Impact on services

The layoffs will impact various departments within HHS, including:

• 3,500 jobs at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), though roles related to drug, medical devices, and food safety will remain intact.
• 2,400 positions at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
• 1,200 roles at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), mainly due to centralisation of administrative services.
• 300 positions at the Centres for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).

The restructuring will also result in the establishment of the Administration for a Healthy America, which will be responsible for areas like primary care, maternal and child health, mental health, environmental health, and HIV/AIDS.

HHS has already issued a formal notice of the layoffs to union officials. The layoffs are to become effective on May 27, according to an email that Thomas J. Nagy Jr., the deputy assistant secretary for human resources at HHS, sent. The affected employees will be notified as soon as Friday.

The reductions will primarily be to administrative jobs like human resources, IT, procurement, and finance.