as cases of With the diarrhea-causing cyclospora parasite on the rise in the United States, former employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the country’s response is being severely hampered by staff cuts at the agency.

Amid massive government layoffs implemented last year by President Donald Trump and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency, the CDC lab that responds to outbreaks of the cyclospora parasite was reduced from 11 people to just three, according to Joel Barratt, a molecular parasitologist and assistant professor at Emory University School of Medicine, who previously led that team.

“Based on simple math, these outbreak responses, which require rapid and timely responses, will be greatly diminished,” he tells WIRED. “Cyclospora is just one piece. It’s making the news right now, but there are other pathogens more dangerous than cyclospora.”

Barratt says he left the CDC voluntarily in September after working at the agency for eight years because he felt he could no longer “do the right thing in public health” amid sweeping policy reforms and personnel purges under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

“It became a hostile work environment,” he says. “I had to sit down with a lot of people in my office and say, ‘Look, I’m really sorry we can’t renew you because of the hiring freeze.’”

WIRED reported in October that the CDC reduced its total workforce by about 3,000 employees (about a quarter of the agency) since January 2025. That figure includes layoffs as well as those who accepted the Trump administration’s purchasing program. The estimate was compiled by the American Federation of Government Employees Local 2883, which represents CDC workers. The size of the cuts in Barratt’s former lab was first reported by Nature.

“CDC has a dedicated team supporting the current response to Cyclospora and continues to work closely with the FDA and health departments in all 50 states,” an agency spokesperson told WIRED. “The agency is actively monitoring cases, collecting and analyzing surveillance data, and working with its state and federal partners to investigate outbreaks. The CDC laboratory supporting the response to Cyclospora was not affected by the RIFs.”

Nearly 7,000 people nationwide may have contracted cyclospora, although experts say the number is almost certainly higher. As of Thursday, Michigan alone has identified more than 4,300 cases.

The CDC is also being pressured by a wave of public health crises. Amid staff reductions, the agency is also responding to a major Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as several outbreaks in the United States, including measles; E.coli linked to frozen blueberries; infant botulism found in certain powdered infant formulas; and salmonella from various sources. The CDC is working to identify the source of the cyclosporiasis outbreak and has identified Taylor Farms lettuce as a possible source, anonymous sources told The Washington Post.

“Even before the 2025 cuts, we knew that our public health surveillance systems and our food safety systems leave a lot to be desired,” says Amira Roess, a professor of global health and epidemiology at George Mason University and a former CDC epidemic intelligence service official.

Barratt says responding to disease outbreaks is a complex process that involves a lot of coordination between states and the federal government.

Cyclospora presents its own set of challenges, particularly the time between when someone is initially exposed to a contaminated food product and the onset of illness. Symptoms may take a week or two to appear, and people who become ill may not seek medical care for several days afterward, if at all.