HHS will slash 10,000 full-time employees, which combined with its previous buyout and early retirement initiatives, will take the agency down from 82,000 to 62,000 workers.

It will also create a new “Administration for a Healthy America,” or AHA, that will combine five independent agencies into one.

Shedding 10,000 employees will save the government $1.8 billion per year, the agency said. It announced the changes in a press release and a fact sheet on Thursday morning, and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. simultaneously posted a video to X

“We’re going to do more with less,” Kennedy said in the video, adding that “this will be a painful period for HHS as we downsize.”

HHS provided numbers on how many employees would be removed from its key sub-agencies, but offered few specifics:

• FDA will lose 3,500 workers, though this won’t affect drug, medical device, and food reviewers, or inspectors
• CDC will lose 2,400 employees, and will focus on preparing for and responding to epidemics and outbreaks
• NIH will lose 1,200 […]