Mission Creep and Wasteful Spending Left the CDC Unprepared for an Actual Public Health Crisis

Reason cites Senior Fellow Michelle Minton on the CDC and the nation’s response to COVID-19:

“The CDC devolved into an agency incapable of adequately addressing the serious threat posed by infectious disease, particularly novel diseases for which there is little information about risk, spread, and treatment,” says Michelle Minton, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market think tank.

Minton is the author of a newly released study showing just how far the CDC has strayed from its core mission. In addition to combating dangerous infectious diseases like HIV and malaria, the CDC now also studies alcohol and tobacco use, athletic injuries, traffic accidents, and gun violence. While those things can indeed be important factors to public health, Minton notes, they don’t seem to fall within the agency’s original mission.

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