The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) disclosed on May 2 that following direction from the Trump administration, the agency’s Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) is disbanded, according to multiple news reports.

NBC News cites a letter that, per committee members was sent out after a virtual meeting, puts the termination as March 31.

HICPAC has historically advised CDC on infection control recommendations, guiding both public health and healthcare settings. Most recently, the committee was working to update Infection Control Precautions in Healthcare Personnel related to recommendations for returning to work following COVID infection, and isolation precautions in healthcare settings.

Recommendations drafted by the committee typically were approved and endorsed by CDC, then released to the public, from which point they were often adopted by federal and state agencies, including the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) as accepted national standards.

Recalling that the Trump administration has previously been highly critical of this function of CDC, viewing it as an overreach of the agency’s role, it is unclear at this time if the administration intends for the agency to continue providing the recommendations that public health and healthcare providers rely on to serve our nation or how this essential gap might be filled should the agency’s role be further diminished.