Public health data disappeared. RestoredCDC.org is bringing it back
93 comments
·March 4, 2025xnx
Were I rich, I would buy a new tld (.usgov?) where we can recreate all the stuff being destroyed.
aqueueaqueue
It is possible for 1yr TC of many people here. But you need to apply and wait. And the same hostile government, using ICANN, can can your TLD.
zamadatix
ICANN would likely not grant such a tld due to similarity concerns with .us/.gov.
You can do the same thing without a tld of course: <original domain>.pubmirror.com (or whatever you want to use) is just about as easy despite an extra dot. My personal fqdn is even shorter than ".usgov"! The hard part is recreating/mirroring all the stuff.
vkou
I think if you were rich, you'd do us a bigger favor by just buying the USGov.
trhway
Musk already did that. Doesn't seem to be working out that well for the "us".
andrewflnr
Right, so at this point the bar for improvement is low.
vkou
I know absolutely nothing about xnx, which leads to me believe that he'd probably do a far better job with it.
blindriver
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tommoor
Could you point to some evidence for this claim?
butterandguns
Idk what you’re talking about but you can’t in good faith say _anything_ about this presidency is comparable to any other US presidency ever. You’re disingenuous, a troll, AI, or all of the above.
null
glial
Link?
beowulfey
For those wondering why this exists: many of the pages that were formerly listed on the CDC website have been disappearing, likely in response to recent executive orders, though this has not been made explicit.
As an example, I checked the Women's Health page and noticed a lot of removals -- the pages on menstrual health and hygiene ([1] vs [2]), or the page summarizing health disease statistics in women ([3] vs [4]). That's just from 5 minutes of glancing through, and there are probably many others.
It is useful to compare the differences between the two sites, but it would definitely benefit from a list of what has been changed. Right now this primarily helps doctors and scientists who need to access data they already knew about (i.e. via bookmarks) but is less useful for observing patterns in what is being censored.
[1]https://www.restoredcdc.org/www.cdc.gov/womens-health/mhh-co...
[2]https://www.cdc.gov/womens-health/mhh-continuing-education/i...
[3]https://www.restoredcdc.org/www.cdc.gov/womens-health/featur...
[4]https://www.cdc.gov/womens-health/features/heart-disease.htm...
buckle8017
The Bureaucracy intentionally read the executive order on gender in a broad and absurd way.
They are doing this specifically to cause this backlash.
beowulfey
Do you work at the CDC? Can you share your sources for this?
We (the general public) know absolutely nothing about why these pages were removed. All we can say definitively is that they are gone.
And spit out baseless speculation too of course.
MyOutfitIsVague
Are all the firings across the federal government just to cause backlash too?
jfengel
So just to confirm: you think this is a bad thing.
Ok. I'll count on you to push back on the President if this indeed turns out to be what he wants.
int_19h
Given that people are being fired left and right on laughable pretexts, I can't blame the people tasked with implementing these executive orders for erring on the side of "what the boss probably wants". Especially when the boss is very loud about what he wants.
owlninja
Good, this is dragging us back to the stone ages.
MathMonkeyMan
To be fair, more like the early 20th century. Or today in much of the world.
huang_chung
[flagged]
cupcakecommons
What has actually disappeared? pubmed went down for a little bit - but it's back now. What is all this about?
apical_dendrite
See pages 6 to 12 of this declaration: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69608613/6/1/doctors-fo...
AlphaSite
I don't think this is exhaustive and things have expanded since this was published, but this[1] somewhat covers this
> CDC webpages currently note that the "CDC's website is being modified to comply with President Trump's Executive Orders." Specifically, the CDC has been purging its website of topics related to diversity, gender identity, and LGBTQ issues. In addition, CDC researchers have been ordered to retract papers submitted to journals that use words or phrases like non-binary, transgender, LGBT, pregnant people, and more.
Ive heard HIV and contraception related information was also removed [2].
> Among the many pages that remain down are Health Disparities Among LQBTQ Youth, Interim Clinical Considerations for Use of Vaccine for Mpox Prevention, and Fast Facts: HIV and Transgender People.
Other government sites [3] had similar purges for different topics:
> The Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York alleges the agency illegally scrapped essential webpages without public notice last month, after USDA Director of Digital Communications Peter Rhee ordered staff to archive or publish “any landing pages focused on climate change.”
[1] https://www.medpagetoday.com/obgyn/generalobgyn/114078
[2] https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/public-health/removal-pages-cdc-w...
[3] https://news.bloomberglaw.com/environment-and-energy/climate...
cupcakecommons
Can you link sites that are actually gone? All of the sites mentioned in those articles is still available (at least for me).
apical_dendrite
Judge Bates issued a temporary restraining order to the CDC to restore certain websites.
fartbagxp
Hmm, the invitation link to discord sends me to a blackhole. Are invitation restricted?
throwaway290
I hate that many projects use Discord where anything else (IRC, Matrix, whatever) would work but in this case especially. Tencent owns an undisclosed share in Discord and just generally seems like a bad choice of communication platform if you want to look better than doge
a_bonobo
Discord works by clicking a button - you get to signup, you fill in your email, bam you're on the Discord channel in your browser. Zero friction, nothing new to learn for the user.
IRC on the other hand....
epistasis
I have never had that experience with discord, despite already having an account. It's truly mysterious what the actual link --> my account has the discord path should be.
I find IRC much easier, but I haven't used it in about 15 years.
rixed
... does not even ask for your email?
xyst
Current administration doing absolutely everything they can to destroy confidence in federal government. All of this so tho oligarchs can get their tax cuts and pave the way for a fully privatized nation.
jquery
Every day seems like the worst day so far. 47 more months to go. Sure would be nice if we had more than one branch of government.
trhway
> to destroy confidence in federal government
not only domestic unfortunately. For 3 years Russian trolls were posting everywhere that US will abandon Ukraine like it happened with Afghanistan and Iraq, and today Trump stopped all the military aid to Ukraine, even the stuff that was already in Poland moving toward the Ukrainian border.
jquery
Is Trump even allowed to do that? Didn't he get impeached for basically the same thing in his last term?
jfengel
Impeached but not convicted. Like getting convicted and receiving zero sentence: it has no consequences and therefore might as well not have happened.
UncleOxidant
He knows this senate wouldn't come close to convicting. Heck, this house wouldn't even impeach.
girvo
No one is going to stop him, and everyone keeps complying, so yes he is allowed to do that.
hedora
If the democrats get enough votes in the house and senate, I imagine they’ll swiftly kick him and hopefully vance out.
For that to happen, the US economy will need to collapse (likely, given the tariffs, dismantling of governments, alienation of all trade partners, and multiple incoming pandemics, including measles, bird flu and ebola).
However, the US will have to be a democracy in 12-24 months, and all of Trump’s actions suggest he thinks that’s unlikely.
int_19h
He got impeached for withholding military aid to force the Ukrainian government to investigate his political opponent, but that's not a factor in this case.
Broadly speaking, Trump claims that he has the power to tell any executive agency to not do anything under the "unitary executive" theory. Whether this holds or not is up to the courts to determine, but unless and until there is a stay, the executive agencies have to follow the EO.
fsdkfdsf
[dead]
jmclnx
[flagged]
supportengineer
Wimps? They are consenting adults
godelski
I don't understand how "consenting adults" implies they aren't "wimps". You can consent to boot licking.
Some people lick the boot by force, some do it because they like the taste of rubber. Do not confuse the two, they are VERY different.
mrtesthah
Many Republican legislators are in fact being coerced with threats of violence.
https://www.vox.com/23899688/2024-election-republican-primar...
https://dailyboulder.com/lifelong-republican-receiving-death...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/27/republicans-...
mschuster91
> “You need to do your fucking job right because other people from other states are watching your ass,” the man allegedly said in a voicemail. “You fucking renege on this deal or give them any more troubles, your ass will never make it to your next little board meeting.”
German election official with about one and a half decades of experience here: That's helluvalot disturbing. This is mafia mentality, this is shit I'd expect out of Belarus (or Russia proper), not out of the US. At that point it might be a valid statement to say that China has fairer elections - they only got one party but at least to common knowledge at least the officials aren't getting direct death threats!
How can y'all expect fair elections to happen when there will be no one left to count, record and certify the votes and results?
wahnfrieden
[flagged]
paulddraper
Godwin's Law does not let up.
null
gotoeleven
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gamegod
It's absolutely abhorrent that you think combating the effects of racism in the healthcare system is political. Do you also believe that about sexism in the healthcare system?
null
gotoeleven
[flagged]
cupcakecommons
[flagged]
redeux
Correctly identifying the systemic causes of poor health outcomes among certain populations isn’t politics.
ethbr1
Parent could have also linked to these statistics on COVID cases and deaths, by ethnicity, if they wanted science:
https://archive.cdc.gov/#/details?url=https://www.cdc.gov/co...
wizzwizz4
Yes, it is. It's also science, and also a good thing, but that doesn't stop it from being politics.
> Politics (from Ancient Greek πολιτικά (politiká) 'affairs of the cities') is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of status or resources. — Wikipedia
Braxton1980
Can you define what "politics" is?
teaearlgraycold
I think viewing racism as a public health problem is valid. Would you be critical of the CDC talking about poverty’s effect on health? Lots of doctors really should be able to prescribe non-drug interventions to provide safe housing and low stress environments to their patients. Many health issues aren’t caused by bodily infections or failures. They’re caused by policy and society. Thus the CDC should be free to discuss politics when they think it’s the right solution to a disease.
dionian
Where does that slippery slope end?
afdslfslkfdsk
[flagged]
ginlio
As https://www.cdc.gov still exists, what is the point of this?
It doesn't give any indication as to what pages have changed for the worse (or have been deleted) and thus would need to be "restored". It just looks like a mirror of the original site.
At the very least, some examples of why this mirror needs to exist would be useful. And what if it keeps out-of-date information published? Who is running this site and how are they going to maintain it?
apical_dendrite
Examples of websites that were removed are available starting on page 6 of this memorandum from the court case [edited to say these are examples of what was removed, it's not a complete list]: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69608613/6/1/doctors-fo...
It's about 6 pages so I won't copy it here, but this was guidance for doctors on issues like HIV prevention, contraception, fertility, and other issues, as well as datasets on which localities are most vulnerable due to social and environmental factors, and guidance on recruiting diverse populations for clinical trials.
ginlio
Thank you. This is exactly what the site should have listed in its about page. Assuming it's still current.
goblinux
The CDC website was gutted in Jan 2025 following the Trump administration’s opening salvo of executive orders. This deprived American (and global) healthcare professionals of valuable information. There has been loss of faith in the CDC and government in general as repositories of scientific literature amongst the healthcare and scientific community, which is why sites like these have popped up
Per the about page, which is linked right at the top of restoredcdc.org:
“ We are developing code to pull CDC pages which were archived by prior to January 20, 2025. Similar archives have been created by the End of Term (https://eotarchive.org) project and are hosted by the Wayback Machine (https://web.archive.org). The individual pages are archived, but links between them are broken and the pages are not easy to locate through web searches. Therefore, we will re-build the links between the pages, to create a site that can be navigated the same way the pre-January 21, 2025 CDC site. The only changes we will make on these pages is to add a header that indicates that this site is not a CDC website.”
MathMonkeyMan
> The CDC website was gutted in Jan 2025
I trust that this is true, but a cursory browsing through 2024 outbreaks, for example, shows the same information.
To your parent poster's point, it would be nice to have a damning example like "look at this thing that was taken down." Maybe such examples belong somewhere else, but it might help dissuade skeptics.
apical_dendrite
Please see pages 6 to 12 in this declaration from the court case for examples of what was taken down. Note that Judge Bates issued a temporary restraining order to the CDC to restore these websites, so it shouldn't look different (except that the CDC put a ridiculous disclaimer on some of the pages) https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69608613/6/1/doctors-fo... [edit - fixed link]
ginlio
What's missing from their about page is any detail that would support these claims. A list of changed and deleted pages would be a good start, so we could at least judge for ourselves.
Also how do we know we can trust whoever is running this site? Compared to the Internet Archive which has a long track record of reliably mirroring any page requested or crawled.
reramuyc
[dead]
gjsman-1000
[flagged]
rezonant
The first amendment prevents the government from abridging the right for people to assemble and peacefully protest. Given that there's a public safety concern, one could argue there's nuance here, but you can hardly blame them for taking the safe route and avoiding violating our constitutional rights, and it's doubtful there was enough precedent for the CDC to feel comfortable taking the legal risk.
luxuryballs
not just conservatives, people who decided we can afford to pay attention and apply critical thinking also lost faith in anything where any combination of 2 or more of the following intersect: corporate profits / medicine / government / politics
deadeye
[flagged]
gjsman-1000
HN doesn’t like reasonable questions in general. Jeff Geerling once got on the wrong side of HN moderation (falsely accused of spamming); you should see the hate for HN in the comments on his post about it. Many choice words, increasingly completely deserved.
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2022/i-almost-got-banned-h...
cupcakecommons
HN is becoming reddit
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