Investigating the CDC

CDC Off Center is a 2007 report, issued by Senator Tom Coburn of the US Senate Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information and International Security Minority Office, found that the CDC is spending hundreds of millions of tax dollars for failed prevention efforts, international trips, and lavish facilities, but it is not able to show that it is doing what it is tasked to do – controlling disease.

From the document (emphasis added).

As this report notes, “CDC Off Center” was not produced because of any personal animosity against the CDC, nor the good people it employs. As a practicing physician, I have consulted CDC’s experts and materials to help me successfully treat my patients, and I value the good work it is capable of doing. Unfortunately in many areas, CDC is just one among many federal agencies that I believe is not properly living up to its own mission.

For some reason, the federal government has a difficult time prioritizing spending and demanding measurable results from those entrusted with billions of hardearned tax dollars to help carry out its crucial missions. …

TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 4
I. BACKGROUND………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 5-7
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
• CDC’s History
• CDC’s Funding
II. FINDINGS………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 8
CDC Facilities: Lavish Spending or Priority Needs? …………………………………………. 8-22
• CDC’s $106 million Thomas R. Harkin Global Communications (and Visitor) Center
• CDC’s new $109.8 million Arlen Specter Headquarters and Emergency Operations
Center has $10 million in furniture
• CDC’s $200,000 fitness center includes $30,000 saunas and rotating light shows
• CDC’s new Hawaii office announced by Hawaii Senator who oversees CDC funds
CDC Targets Diseases … Results Still Pending: ………………………………..…. 23-80
• CDC’s prevention funding for HIV/AIDS: $5 billion over seven years
• Of CDC’s $2.6 billion in HIV/AIDS grants, some have no objectives and are “abysmal,”
yet funded anyway
• CDC’s domestic HIV/AIDS program: results not demonstrated
• CDC-funded events featuring porn stars, transgender beauty pageants, and flirting classes
• CDC’s $45 million for conferences featuring prostitutes, protests, and beach parties
• CDC announces plan to eliminate syphilis: five years later rates up overall and 68
percent among men
• CDC’s $335 million kid-targeted media campaign to fight obesity: advertising success
but health impact unknown
• CDC addresses serious health issues like land development and bike paths
• CDC and guns as a “health problem”
CDC’s Statistic Problems and Fraud: ………………………………….…….……… 81-86
• CDC revises U.S. obesity deaths by 1,400 percent in nine months
• CDC Inspector General investigations find over $1 million in fraud in just three cases
It Pays to be a CDC Employee: …………………….……………………………… 87-103
• CDC pays $1.7 million to Hollywood liaison; ex-employee runs liaison shop
• CDC’s top financial officers take home a quarter of a million dollars in bonuses
• The revolving door: how a former CDC executive lands CDC contracts worth millions
for minority-owned companies
• CDC pays two former employees $250,000 to help build morale
• HHS Secretary uses CDC’s leased jet for meetings and speeches: CDC defends use
How CDC Funding is Counterintuitive: ………………………………………….. 104-110
• CDC-funded bar night and manual on how to throw an alcohol party
• CDC sets bioterrorism results-oriented goals after spending billions
III. RECOMMENDATIONS………………………………………………………………………………………. 111-113
IV. CONCLUSION………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 114
APPENDIX………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….115
• AIDS Funding Cart

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

A recent survey showed that Americans overwhelmingly know of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and most give it positive remarks for the job they believe CDC is doing.1

Bolstered by this public perception, year after year, supporters of the CDC seek additional funding for the agency, often under the auspices of making America healthier and safer.

Yet while CDC has been given millions, and in some cases billions, of dollars to help prevent certain diseases among Americans, for many of these diseases the rates have not decreased, but have stayed the same or even increased under CDC’s watch. In the case of HIV, despite spending billions of dollars, CDC cannot even report how many Americans have the communicable disease.2

This is not to say that CDC is not trying to tackle these diseases, or that the people who work at the agency are intentionally misusing taxpayers’ hard-earned money. A review of recent CDC expenditures, however, demonstrates that a reprioritization of CDC funding and a review of the approach to certain types of disease prevention are long overdue.

In fiscal year 2007, the CDC has a budget of $10 billion and a stated mission “To promote health and quality of life by preventing and controlling disease, injury, and disability.”

The CDC’s website says the agency, “pledges to the American people: To be a diligent steward of the funds entrusted to it. …To place the benefits to society above the benefits to the institution” and it lists as one of its core values “accountability.” The mission statement continues: “As diligent stewards of public trust and public funds, we act decisively and compassionately in service to the people’s health. We ensure that our research and our services are based on sound science and meet real public needs to achieve our public health goals.”3

This report seeks to hold CDC accountable to the taxpayers and to highlight spending decisions that, in some instances, appear to demonstrate questionable stewardship of public funds.

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