To the editor:
Americans' distrust of science isn't merely leading to lower vaccination rates for such preventable diseases as measles; it's also fueling shortsighted proposals to scale back public-health programs that save lives and taxpayer dollars ("RFK Jr., Measles and Dr. Fauci," Review & Outlook, July 10).
The 2026 presidential budget proposes to cut roughly 40% of the budgets for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health, which perform state-of-the-art research on a broad spectrum of public-health threats.
Proposed appropriations aside, $11 billion in cuts in early 2025 to already cash-strapped state and local health departments are leading to layoffs and cancelled data-infrastructure upgrades that hamper their ability to keep their communities safe. These will significantly impair public-health departments' ability to track foodborne illnesses, alert schools to infectious disease outbreaks, prevent deadly drug overdoses, monitor environmental toxins and implement mobile health screenings for chronic diseases like diabetes, among others. Identifying emerging threats early helps public-health officials act quickly to save lives, reduce the chances of lifelong complications and prevent costly hospitalizations and treatments that burden our healthcare system.
We are doubtless in need of reforms that make public-health expenditures more efficient and focused, but the wholesale gutting of America's public-health infrastructure is dangerous. As former CDC Director Thomas Frieden put it: "You don't improve things by destroying them, you improve them by improving them."
Henry I. Miller, M.D.
Redwood City, Calif.