Last week, Patrick White fired hundreds of bullets at the Atlanta headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control. He believed that coronavirus vaccines had harmed him
Lauren Weber and Lena H. Sun at WP
For many in public health, the shooting seemed to vindicate their long-running fears that the backlash to their work during the coronavirus pandemic could turn deadly. Some left the field after a vitriolic response to mandates for masking and vaccination. Armed protesters gathered outside the homes of health officials. Some health officials faced death threats, including Anthony S. Fauci, one of the leaders of the federal coronavirus response.
Days after the shooting, the initial shock has morphed into anger for many CDC employees, according to interviews with more than a dozen of them, most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.
They fault President Donald Trump for not publicly condemning the shooting as of Tuesday, even as he invoked the assault of a former U.S. DOGE Service staffer to deploy troops in D.C. and take over its police department. They said they are fed up with how they and their work are being derided and impugned by conservatives and anti-vaccine activists, including the one who rose to lead the nation’s public health apparatus: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Before joining the government, Kennedy falsely called the coronavirus vaccine the “deadliest vaccine ever made” and said it contained a “poison.” During his unsuccessful presidential campaign last year, Kennedy posted on X: “As President, I will clean up the cesspool of corruption at CDC and force the public health agencies to come clean about Covid vaccines. I’ll hold responsible those who lied or concealed critical health information …”
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“There is a direct line from the vilification of CDC during Covid and the deliberate lies and mis/disinformation that continues today,” a veteran CDC official who was not on campus during the shooting said in a text message. “Many of the sources of these lies now have a pulpit and the veneer of respectability through their positions in the administration.”
