Nearly Half of CDC Surveillance Databases Halted Updates

RT’s Three Key Takeaways:

1. Widespread data interruptions: Nearly half (46%) of frequently updated CDC health surveillance databases had stopped or delayed updates in 2025, most for longer than six months.
2. Impact on critical health areas: The majority of paused systems tracked vaccination and respiratory disease data, raising concerns about weakened clinical guidance and public health decision-making.
3. Need for transparency and accountability: Researchers and experts warn that unexplained data gaps undermine public trust and call for clear reporting on delays, causes, and timelines for resuming updates.

An audit of US CDC public databases found that nearly half of routinely updated federal health surveillance systems had stopped or delayed updates in 2025, according to research published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

The halt in published information raises concerns that gaps in data, particularly on vaccinations and respiratory diseases, could undermine clinical guidance, public health policy, and public trust, researchers from Vanderbilt University, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and Boston University School of Law say.

For the study, scientists aimed to identify which CDC databases had unexplained pauses in updates and evaluate how common such pauses were among frequently updated CDC databases were.

They reviewed the CDC’s public data catalog in October 2025, examining more than 1,300 listed databases and focusing on those that had previously been updated at least monthly. Using each database’s stated update schedule, they classified whether updates were current or paused.

According to their findings: Of the 82 databases that met inclusion criteria

• 46% had halted updates, most for more than six months.
• The majority of paused databases tracked vaccination-related information, while others covered respiratory diseases and drug overdose deaths. As of early December 2025, almost none had resumed updating.
• On the basis of each database’s stated periodicity, allowing for an additional 30-day grace period, their status was classified as either current or paused as of 28 October 2025.
• Forty-four databases (54%) were current, and 38 (46%) were paused.
• Thirty-four of the 38 databases (89%) had no data entries dated within 6 months of the date of analysis, whereas 4 (11%) paused more recently.
  • Of the 38 paused databases, 33 (87%) were vaccination-related topics compared with none of the 44 current databases.
    • Of the 5 paused databases on other topics, 4 addressed respiratory diseases, including disease burden and nonvaccine prevention measures, whereas 1 addressed public health (drug overdose deaths).
  • As of December 2, 2025 only 1 of the 38 paused databases had been updated. 

The authors conclude that prolonged, unexplained pauses in federal health surveillance data risk weakening evidence-based decision-making and recommend minimum transparency standards, including clear status updates, reasons for delays, and timelines for resuming data publication.

In an accompanying editorial, Jeanne Marrazzo, MD, MPH, CEO of the Infectious Disease Society of America, discusses the role of CDC surveillance in the ability to coordinate effective, urgent responses to public health concerns. Dr. Marrazzo notes that without reliable data, the US is not only flying blind in the face of emerging and re-emerging threats to human health and well-being, but also is deprived of effective weaponry.