{"id":435500,"date":"2026-01-27T02:18:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T02:18:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/435500\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T02:18:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T02:18:08","slug":"nearly-half-of-cdc-databases-arent-being-updated-as-experts-sound-alarm-over-gaps-in-health-data","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/435500\/","title":{"rendered":"Nearly half of CDC databases aren\u2019t being updated as experts sound alarm over gaps in health data"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nearly half of federal health surveillance databases<\/a> either stopped or delayed routine updates last year, with potentially dire consequences to public health<\/a>, according to researchers.<\/p>\n

A newly-released audit<\/a> of nearly 1,400 public records from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention<\/a> revealed that 38 of the agency\u2019s 82 databases that were normally updated monthly had unexplained pauses starting last spring.<\/p>\n

More than a third of the 38 paused databases had stops lasting for more than half a year, and only one was updated by the second of December, researchers at Vanderbilt University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Boston University School of Law said.<\/p>\n

Nearly 90 percent of the paused databases reported vaccination topics<\/a>, while others covered respiratory diseases<\/a> and drug overdose deaths.<\/p>\n

The pause on these topics could stymie critical information about respiratory illnesses and other health-related threats, potentially leading to eroded public trust, the researchers said.<\/p>\n

\"People<\/p>\n

People demonstrate outside the main campus of the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, in April 2025. Researchers say an audit shows nearly half of the agency\u2019s federal health surveillance databases had unexplained pauses in updates starting under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence is damning: The administration\u2019s antivaccine stance has interrupted the reliable flow of the data we need to keep Americans safe from preventable infections,\u201d Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who is suing the administration over public health warnings<\/a> and did not contribute to the research, asserted in an accompanying editorial<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe consequences will be dire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marrazzo added that failing to provide accurate and timely data to public health leaders and providers would undermine the ability to recognize disease outbreaks and respond to them, also noting that the findings were consistent with actions taken by the administration to undermine trust around vaccines.<\/p>\n

The study did not determine reasons for the pauses, but she said she believed whether or not the data interruptions reported were due to intentional disregard for sharing data on immunizations or to workforce shortages due to the agency\u2019s reduction in force likely did not matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cEither causative pathway demonstrates a profound disregard for human life, scientific progress, and the dedication of the public health workforce that has provided a bulwark against the advance of emerging, and reemerging infectious diseases,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The Independent\u2019s request for comment from the Department of Health and Human Services was not immediately returned.<\/p>\n

Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the department, told NBC News<\/a> that the CDC reports Covid and Respiratory syncytial virus activity through its respiratory virus surveillance systems and weekly flu activity through a database called FluView.<\/p>\n

\u201cChanges to individual dashboards or update schedules reflect routine data quality and system management decisions, not political direction,\u201d he said. \u201cUnder this administration, public health data reporting is driven by scientific integrity, transparency, and accuracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Flying blind\u2019<\/p>\n

The audit builds upon previous research<\/a> showing that staff cuts last year had eliminated more than a dozen data-gathering programs that track death and disease, including some related to pregnancy<\/a>, abortions, job-related injuries, sexual violence and lead poisonings.<\/p>\n

And, it\u2019s not just the data reporting that stopped. Pages of public data were erased<\/a> from the CDC\u2019s website, departments were shuttered<\/a> and newsletters stopped going out<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cMissing that expertise and that connection between laboratory information and outbreak investigation means we are flying blind,\u201d Scott Becker, the CEO of the Association of Public Health Laboratories, told POLITICO<\/a> in April. \u201cThe critical services that they provide to public health labs in the country that are really not replicated anywhere else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.<\/a> said in April that he was \u201cslashing unhealthy fat\u201d at the CDC<\/a>, and that some of the agency\u2019s work would be moved to a new Administration for a Healthy America.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A member of a medical staff administers a dose of the measles vaccine to a child at a health center in Lubbock, Texas, in February 2025. The U.S. is seeing its worst outbreak of the vaccine-preventable virus in over three decades (AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the department told NPR<\/a> that efforts to create the administration are still in the works – but any timeline for that remains unclear.<\/p>\n

A historic problem<\/p>\n

All of this comes amid what has become a historic public health crisis, in which vaccination plays a key role.<\/p>\n

The U.S. is experiencing the worst outbreak of the measles virus in more than 30 years and a continuous rise of vaccine hesitancy<\/a>, including at the HHS<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Scientists are waiting to see if America will lose its longstanding measles elimination status and CDC data updated on Friday<\/a> shows 416 cases reported so far this year in 14 states.<\/p>\n

But measles is vaccine-preventable, and two doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine are 97 percent effective against the highly contagious illness.<\/p>\n

The outbreak comes as Americans also have to contend with a surge of whooping cough<\/a>, along with a nasty and severe flu season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

These threats are why keeping databases updated is crucial, according to Marrazzo.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrafting a rapid response to these types of events requires that we know about them in the first place,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nearly half of federal health surveillance databases either stopped or delayed routine updates last year, with potentially dire…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":435501,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[49,48,49361,84,180928,180932,180929,5838,2727,180931,10571,41389,21425,180930,5853],"class_list":["post-435500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-databases","tag-health","tag-health-surveillance","tag-health-related","tag-jeanne-marrazzo","tag-jr","tag-public-health","tag-public-health-crisis","tag-researchers","tag-respiratory-diseases","tag-robert-f-kennedy","tag-university-of-north-carolina-at-chapel-hill","tag-vanderbilt-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}