You have a point, in that the stated mission isn’t to cure.
As the nation’s health protection agency, CDC saves lives and protects people from health threats. To accomplish our mission, CDC conducts critical science and provides health information that protects our nation against expensive and dangerous health threats, and responds when these arise.
Although, I would point out that each and every state also has a public health office in operation. The CDC does not perform food production inspections and such - that’s FDA. Or the state where the operation is located. And, they all have each others’ phone numbers. Nobody has to die just because the CDC is on furlough. (And mentioning the CDC in a comparison to hurricanes is just…unfortunate. Katrina. They didn’t even bother to show until long after the ‘festivities’ had begun.)
No, sorry. I do not have a link to the report handy. I have a copy of it, though long since buried on a drive at another location. I assume it can be still be had by googling it, tho? Let me know if you can’t get it that way, and I’ll look around for it when I get to that other drive, k?
FWIW, I do not merely make unfounded accusations as to the CDC’s failures. I participated in a GAO investigation of CDC’s responses to particular OEH issues. They lost the funding connected to those acts as a result of that investigation, and deservedly so. They are highly focused on their ability to get press - which can be used legitimately. It can just as easily be used to pump their own internal agenda, though, and has been.
At the moment all we’re hearing is a lot of threatening and scary-sounding language in their press release - no numbers, no demographics, not enough to get all excited about yet, anyway. Ratio of epidemic to furlough stuff? Pretty low. And mentions they’re only down about 33% of staff. That would be federal employees, and not include contractors (about 60% of total people) or fellows on internships. IOW - there are literally thousands of people there, even with a furlough.
