Scientists, researchers, and public health advocates are scrambling to archive thousands of pages of federal health data that were removed from government websites following President Donald Trump's executive orders targeting "gender ideology" and diversity efforts, The Hill reported.
Public health experts and private organizations rushed to salvage as much federal data as possible last week after learning that government agencies had begun removing critical health information from their websites.
The deletions came after Trump signed executive orders to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives across federal agencies.
The impact was swift: More than 80,000 pages disappeared from more than a dozen U.S. government websites, according to a New York Times analysis.
Among them were Centers for Disease Control and Prevention resources for tracking HIV and sexually transmitted infections and federal guidelines for birth control, and gender-transitioning treatment.
The National Institutes of Health Office of Research on Women's Health website was offline.
"The deletion of information or just the threat of it should make us uneasy," said Candace St. John, who is working with Alt CDC, a collective of public health workers focused on preserving federal data. "It's something that is really going to undermine a lot of communities across the nation."
Though some information, such as the CDC's Atlas Tool for tracking HIV and STIs, has been restored, health professionals say the resources that have reappeared are incomplete.
Virologist Angie Rasmussen, who learned about the removals from a reporter, quickly moved to download critical CDC data.
"I immediately went to the data I would need and started downloading," she said.
She used archive.org to preserve as much of the CDC's website as possible. At the same time, Michigan-based data analyst Charles Gaba successfully downloaded the agency's entire site and posted links to his webpage.
Other organizations, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, have reposted CDC guidelines on their websites.
Despite these efforts, large amounts of public health data remain missing.
Justin Gill, an urgent care nurse practitioner, experienced this firsthand last week when he tried to look up CDC guidelines on syphilis treatment during a discussion with a colleague.
"I was trying to look up guidelines ... and that resource was completely gone," he said.
Gill emphasized that the CDC was once considered the "gold standard" for health information, adding that many alternative resources ultimately rely on CDC data.
"The benefit of that information wasn't only that it was accurate, but also that it was centralized," he said. "Now, if doctors or nurses can't find the information they need, they will have to find it elsewhere, causing them to spend less time with patients."
The removals have also disrupted the CDC's routine communications.
The agency temporarily paused its reports, including the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, which provides crucial public health updates.