Federal Judge Rules FDA, CDC Must Restore Health Websites Removed Under Trump Order

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 12, 2025 (HealthDay News) — A federal judge has ordered the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to restore access to public health websites that were removed or modified in response to a Trump administration executive order on gender.

The order, issued Feb. 11 by U.S. District Judge John Bates, grants a temporary restraining order requested by Doctors for America, a nonprofit group that sued the administration over the website removals.

The affected sites, some of which have been online for decades, contain public health information on HIV prevention, youth health risks, fertility treatments and more.

The ruling states that the two health agencies removed the sites without explanation and likely violated federal law.

“By removing long relied upon medical resources without explanation, it is likely that … each agency failed to ‘examine the relevant data and articulate a satisfactory explanation for its action,’” Bates wrote.

He ordered the CDC and FDA to restore access by the day”s end Tuesday, a process that staff members were scrambling to complete.

“It was a double waste for us because we took them offline, put some of them back, edited others and now are putting it back again,” a federal health official who wanted to remain anonymous told The Washington Post.

The removed sites included:

• The CDC”s guidelines for HIV and PrEP, a medication that reduces the risk of contracting AIDS.

• The CDC”s Social Vulnerability Index — which was key to identifying high-risk hot spots during COVID.

• FDA databases that track diversity in clinical trials.

• The National Assisted Reproductive Technologies Surveillance System, which monitors fertility treatment success rates.

• Information on youth health risks.

Some researchers also reported that scientific studies on racial health disparities were removed, The Washington Post reported.

Lucia Leone, an associate professor of community health and health behavior at the University of Buffalo, said in a social media post that a 2017 study she co-authored on food access in low-income communities was taken down, likely because it contained the word “diverse.”

Physicians and researchers were alarmed about the removals.

“Restoring access to this vital data is welcome news, if it happens,” Dr. Steven Woolf, director emeritus and professor of family medicine and population health at Virginia Commonwealth University, told The Washington Post. “But this list doesn’t cover everything that has gone missing.”

Some doctors who treat HIV patients said they were already struggling without the CDC’s HIV and PrEP guidelines.