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October 03, 2025
3 min read
Key takeaways:
- Jeanne M. Marrazzo, MD, MPH, was director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
- Marrazzo and another NIH scientist filed whistleblower complaints over their removals earlier this year.
A top NIH official who filed a whistleblower complaint last month alleging she was removed from her job for political reasons has been fired by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., according to her attorney.
Jeanne M. Marrazzo, MD, MPH, had been director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 2023, replacing Anthony S. Fauci, MD. She was removed from that position on March 31 and offered reassignment to the Indian Health Service amid mass layoffs within HHS.
A top NIH official was fired after filing a whistleblower complaint against HHS. Image: Grandbrothers – stock.adobe.com.
Last month, Marrazzo and another top NIH scientist, Kathleen M. Neuzil, MD, MPH, who led the agency’s international research and training arm, filed whistleblower complaints alleging that they were removed from their positions for defending research grants and vaccines and resisting efforts to prioritize politics over science.
The complaints described the environment inside the NIH in the wake of Kennedy’s confirmation in February as being hostile toward evidence-based science, including vaccines.
Marrazzo and Neuzil are former members of the Healio | Infectious Disease News Editorial Board.
According to her attorney, Marrazzo was notified on Oct. 1 that she had been fired, just over 3 weeks after filing her whistleblower complaint. The attorney called Marrazzo’s removal “illegal” and called the proposal to transfer her to the Indian Health Service — a move that never materialized — “retaliatory.”
“Now, with her firing, there is no doubt she was removed from her position as director of NIAID in retaliation for her protected whistleblower activity,” the attorney, Debra S. Katz, said in a statement.
As director of the NIAID, Marrazzo oversaw a budget of more than $6 billion and a staff numbering in the thousands. Prior to taking over for Fauci, she was the director of the division of infectious diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and a leading HIV and STD researcher.
In their complaints, Marrazzo and Neuzil alleged that the Trump administration canceled grants and clinical trials “for political reasons” and described Kennedy and other federal health officials as being dismissive of vaccines.
Several medical associations have sued Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine advocate, and HHS over changes to federal vaccine recommendations.
In a statement issued through her attorneys after her firing, Marrazzo urged Congress to “act to protect scientific research from those who would serve political interests first.”
“I took on the role of NIAID director because I wanted to lead the premier biomedical research organization in the world. I proudly stand by my leadership of the institute and the thousands of committed scientists and staff who make essential, lifesaving research possible,” Marrazzo said.
“My termination, unfortunately, shows that the leaders of HHS and the National Institutes of Health do not share my commitment to scientific integrity and public health,” she said.
Marrazzo and HHS did not immediately respond to our requests for comment. Marrazzo’s firing was first reported by Science, which said three other NIH institute directors were also fired: Diana W. Bianchi, MD, director of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development; Eliseo J. Pérez-Stable, MD, head of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities; and Shannon Zenk, RN, PhD, MPH, director of the National Institute of Nursing Research.
According to the Science story, Marrazzo and Bianchi received letters from Kennedy in which he cited a federal law giving him power to appoint directors of NIH institutes.
There has been considerable turmoil within the nation’s public health agencies since Kennedy took over HHS. Infectious diseases have been at the center of some of his most criticized decisions, including the firing of 17 CDC vaccine advisors in June and his demand that then-CDC director Susan Monarez, PhD, fire several senior CDC officials, which she refused to do, leading to her own termination. The officials, who later resigned, included the heads of the CDC centers dedicated to respiratory diseases and immunization and emerging and zoonotic diseases.
Monarez’s firing came less than a month after she was confirmed and weeks after a gunman said to be distrustful of COVID-19 vaccines opened fire on CDC headquarters in Atlanta.
Kennedy faced questions about his management of HHS in a sometimes heated Senate hearing last month that often focused on changes to federal vaccine recommendations and other matters related to infectious diseases.
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