AHCJ secretary and co-chair of Right to Know Committee
In early May, reporters started noticing that a handy resource had been rendered nearly useless. The directory that once provided the email addresses and phone numbers of 90,000 employees of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services now contains only names and titles, no contact information.
Apparently first publicized in a blog post by Bruce Quinn, M.D., Ph.D., and later noted by Politico, the move was denounced as a step away from transparency.
In a phone conversation, an HHS spokesperson said the directory will be back online “in some form or fashion.” The spokesperson could not say what specific contact details would be restored, or provide a timeline.
The database was taken down due to security concerns, officials said.
When HHS employees began working from home during the pandemic, some staff added their personal contact information, the spokesperson told AHCJ. The national response to COVID-19 became a hot-button political issue, and pandemic-related decisions that some people “vehemently disagree with” resulted in several HHS staff receiving verbal and physical threats, including at least one incident.