Employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Centers express frustration by the Minister of Health Robert F. Kennedy Junior former vaccine comments, after the shooting on Friday at the Agency headquarters in Atlanta, which left one police officer.
Although the motive behind the suspected shooting – Patrick White, 30, from Kenissao, Georgia – is still unknown, he told one of the neighbors that he believed that Covid vaccines made him sick.
Kennedy visited the headquarters of the Disease Control Center earlier on Monday, when security led him during the campus, pointing to the shattered windows through multiple buildings, according to a statement issued by the Ministry of Health and Humanitarian Services. Later, Kennedy met with the widow of the dead police officer.
The employees were directed to work remotely this week. A virtual meeting is only to be held for all employees on Tuesday, although it is not clear whether Kennedy will attend.
The shooting was launched near the campus of the Disease Control Center, which includes a daytime care center inside the campus and the University of Emory.
For some employees, the rising fire has highlighted the increasing hostility towards public health officials, which they feel formed through Kennedy’s long history of publishing information to mislead the vaccine, including the Covid vaccine.
In 2021, Kennedy Citizen contact A student from the Food and Drug Administration to nullify the license of Covid vaccines. In the same year, the Covid snapshot was described as “the most ever made vaccine.”
Just last week, Kennedy ended 22 contracts that focused on developing the Rana Merseuled Divis – the same technology used to develop Covid’s Pfizer and Moderna. In an advertisement of X, Kennedy claimed that “a flexible technique poses more risks than the benefits of these respiratory viruses.”
In an email statement, Andrew Nixon, HHS spokesperson, said that Kennedy “has underestimated the horrific attack and is still completely committed to ensuring the safety and well -being of the employees of the Disease Control Center.”
“This is the time to solidarity with our public health strength,” Nixon said.
Kennedy has not yet publicly talked about information to mislead the vaccine, which may have contributed to the shooting.
Several studies have shown that Covid vaccines are safe and effective.
“There is a lot of wrong information, and a lot of really dangerous speech is currently published by the current administration, which makes us look like wicked, which makes us seem to be our work to harm people,” said Elysabeth Soda, an employee at the Disease Control Center in an interview. “So it is not surprising, as well, that people will listen to our leaders.”
“Screen ram”
Dr. Peter Chen-Hong, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco, said the Kofid vaccine has become an easy-to-scrub-a symbol of all the losses that the epidemic inflicts on people, including life loss, physical health and personal freedoms.
He said: “The vaccine is something you can focus on, instead of feeling a general loss.”
Even before the shooting at the Disease Control Center, there were multiple threats against Dr. Anthony Fushi, former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and other public health experts. Chen Hong said he had received many e -mails threatened daily at the height of the epidemic. These days, he gets “hate” emails once a week. Usually, the first line reads and then deletes it.
However, he feels that he is often not safe because he is in general talks about vaccines. As a public health expert, he thinks about it as a duty. The launch of CDC has increased those concerns.
He said: “The accident of the Disease Control Center makes me feel really more at risk.”
In the staff chat chats, employees also express frustration with Kennedy.
“People are that this is natural progress when years distorting distorting science and public health, and they publish wrong information about vaccines and publicly attack federal workers,” said one of the employees of the Disease Control Center.
The source added: “People, including me, are angry,” the source added.
An employee of the Ministry of Health and Humanitarian Services, who oversees the Center for Disease Control, said that it was not lost on them that Kennedy “clarified our work.”
In an email obtained by NBC News, Kennedy told the employees of the Disease Control Center on Saturday that he was praying for the entire agency, adding that the shooting was “very worrying”, especially for those working in Atlanta.
“We want everyone to know, you are not alone,” Kennedy wrote.