On the afternoon of Aug. 8, 2025, an active shooter fired roughly 500 rounds in and around the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta. About 180 rounds struck or passed through CDC windows and walls. DeKalb County Officer David Rose, a 33-year-old former Marine, was killed defending the campus; the shooter died across the street from the CDC entrance. The attacker told others he blamed the CDC and Covid-19 vaccines for his health problems.
From the author’s office, the event began as an unusual noise and quickly escalated as colleagues reported shaking buildings and alerts warned of an active shooter. The campus sheltered in place for hours while police and SWAT teams cleared buildings methodically.
Staff on site experienced prolonged lockdowns and direct threats. Laboratory personnel mid-experiment hid under benches and waited for clearance. One team member was in a hallway when a bullet shattered her window and sprayed her office with glass. A young mother waited inside her car in the CDC daycare parking lot until police permitted her to retrieve her child.
Emergency responders redirected traffic from Clifton Road as firetrucks and law enforcement converged. It was nearly midnight before employees were allowed to leave after the building-by-building sweep.
In the months immediately before and after the shooting, the CDC experienced significant personnel and leadership upheaval. The author reports staff reassignments and dismissals, budget uncertainties, disregard for established science-based decision making, and the firing of a Senate-confirmed CDC director who refused to approve vaccine recommendations that lacked an evidence basis. The author and several agency leaders resigned days after the shooting; the author left after 31 years at CDC.
These changes followed a period of eroded institutional trust dating from the Covid-19 pandemic, and the shooting intensified the sense that the agency itself had become a target not only of violence but of political and public pressure.
Public confidence in CDC guidance declined through 2026. The author cites a poll finding that fewer than half (47%) of the public said they had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the CDC to provide reliable information about vaccines. The workforce has reportedly lost around 25% of staff due to firings, retirements, and departures.
Scholars and colleagues have described the agency as being in “critical condition,” and noted how antivaccine rhetoric has spread rapidly, complicating the agency’s ability to communicate and lead on public health matters.
The agency faces policy and funding threats. The author notes a proposed presidential budget that would cut CDC funding by about 40% for 2027, while acknowledging that Congress determines final appropriations. In addition, the vaccine advisory process has been reorganized to operate outside its usual evidence-review channels, and rhetoric from political leaders has increasingly framed career scientists as adversaries rather than protectors.
These shifts include changes to decision-making norms and oversight that, according to the author, risk undermining the science-based processes that underpin public health recommendations and emergency responses.
The author argues that public health must now protect not only people from outbreaks but also the institutions and processes that enable protection. Specific safeguards proposed or implied in the account include:
These measures are presented as necessary complements to continuing to accelerate the central public health mission of moving from detection to protection (D2P): finding threats quickly and translating those findings into action that saves lives.
Rebuilding public trust is framed as essential to restoring the agency’s ability to protect health. The author emphasizes leading with honesty about uncertainty, explaining reasoning openly, and giving the public a genuine voice in decisions rather than relying solely on downstream messaging.
The shooting underscored that CDC employees routinely return to work because they are committed to fighting outbreaks, yet individual resilience cannot substitute for structural protections that preserve the institution, its people, and the norms of evidence-based public health. The author concludes that protecting the process of protection is now as urgent as improving speed and efficiency in outbreak detection and response.
Daniel B. Jernigan, M.D., M.P.H., is identified in the source as the former director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases and resigned from CDC in 2025 after 31 years of service.