The CDC intends to reorganize itself

Last update: Tuesday 4/5/22 

On 4/5/22, the online Washington Post published an article with an unlikely headline, "CDC, under fire for covid response, announces plans to revamp agency". In other words, the CDC intends to reorganize itself.  But it gets better. The article informs us that the CDC will disband the interdepartmental teams that managed its day-do-day COVID responses, and will "return more activities to existing offices". In other words, the CDC wants to get back to normal living. So do we all.  The article was largely based on a copy of an email the Post obtained that the CDC Director had sent to all CDC employees. Or ... maybe ... there was a snafu in their system? Today is the fifth ... Maybe this email was supposed to go out four days ago. That's it. April Fool!!!  ... not really ... :-(

The editor of this blog has posted note after note that cried out again and again for President Biden to conduct a total reorganization of the CDC from top to bottom, a tumultuous effort that must be led by an experienced turnaround artist. A few of these articles are listed in the "Related notes" section at the end of this note.

Hewing to the neoskeptic principles declared in the blog's "Our Platform" manifesto, his criticisms were based on publicly available information. By contrast, the criticisms of more prominent observers were based on public data plus interviews with CDC personnel and observations of its facilities; nevertheless, they identify the same shortfalls.

• "C.D.C. Labs Were Contaminated, Delaying Coronavirus Testing, Officials Say", Sheila Kaplan, NY Times, Sunday 4/19/20 ... This story also covered by the Washington Post, Sunday 4/19/20
  
  
• ‘How Could the CDC Make That Mistake?’", Alexis C. Madrigal and Robinson Meyer, The Atlantic, 5/21/20
  
  
• The CDC Waited 'Its Entire Existence for this Moment.' What Went Wrong", Eric Lipton, Abby Goodnough, Michael D. Shear, Megan Twohey, Apoorva Mandavilli, Sheri Fink and Mark Walker, NY Times, 6/3/20
  
  
• "COVID proved the CDC is broken. Can it be fixed?", Jeneen Interland, NY Times, 6/16/21
  
  
• "Show Me the Data!", Zeynep Tufekci, NY Times, 8/27/21
  
  
• "The C.D.C. Has New Covid Guidelines. This Is What It Got Wrong.", Aaron E. Carroll, NY Times, 12/28/21 
  
  
• "The C.D.C. Is Hoping You’ll Figure Covid Out on Your Own", Zeynep Tufekci, NY Times, 1/5/22 

Throughout 2020, the first year of the pandemic and the last year of Trump's administration, the liberal/progressive media blamed the CDC's pratfalls on the president. Nevertheless, came 2021 and a new president who appointed a new CDC director, the CDC continued to commit unforced blunders of the first magnitude. By now it should be undeniable by all that the CDC is a deeply dysfunctional organization and has been so for many years prior to both Biden and Trump. Nobody noticed until the CDC failed to meet the pandemic's biggest challenges again and again. At this point, the notion that an organization that is as deeply dysfunctional as the CDC can reorganize itself is ludicrous. 

The ancient taunt "Physician, heal thyself!" is usually hurled at busy bodies who propose to solve other people's problems, even though their own problems are much, much bigger. How ironic that the CDC, a/k/a the nation's physician, now proposes to heal itself after it has failed time and again throughout the pandemic to hail the nation.

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Links to related notes on this blog:  

• "An open letter to President Biden regarding the critical need to reorganize the CDC immediately", Last update: 6/17/21
  
  
• "Avoiding the CDC's systemic blunders and flip flops", Last update: 1/7/22
  
  
• "The CDC needs to be reorganized from top to bottom ... Part 1 (Trump's Disdain)", Last update: 1/22/22
  
  
• "The CDC needs to be reorganized from top to bottom ... Part 2 (Biden's Turnaround Artist)", Last update: 1/11/22
  
  
• "Strategic implications of some basic facts about the CDC", Last update: 3/19/22