It was January when the email came. After a roughly six-month-long hiring process that included fingerprinting and other background checks, an official offer of employment at the United States Centers

The Trump administration’s sudden dismissals have stripped training programs across the nation that bolstered state and local public health departments

Local and state officials say CDC departures threaten to undermine the nation’s effort to identify and control infectious disease outbreaks.

The Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will launch a study into the potential connection between autism and vaccines, according to Reuters and multiple other news outlets.

It is unclear whether U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who has long promoted anti-vaccine views, is involved in the planned CDC study or how it would be carried out.

The US Department of Health and Human Services asked the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to study vaccines and autism, a person familiar with the situation told CNN, despite strong evidence that vaccines do not cause autism.