(Reuters) -U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has fired two of his top aides, chief of staff Heather Flick Melanson and deputy chief of staff for policy Hannah Anderson, an agency spokesperson told Reuters on Wednesday.
The spokesperson said Matt Buckham will serve as acting chief of staff, effective immediately.
Buckham currently serves as the Secretary's White House Liaison at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, where he oversees the recruitment and onboarding
of political appointees across the agency.
Since taking over as U.S. health secretary, Kennedy has proposed to overhaul the department by reorganizing several HHS agencies and substantially cutting their workforce. Earlier this month, a federal judge blocked the administration's plan to implement the restructuring.
Kennedy, who for decades has sown doubt about the safety of vaccines contrary to evidence and research by scientists, in June fired all 17 members an independent panel of experts that advises CDC on vaccine policy, and replaced them with seven new hand-picked members.
The news of the layoffs was first reported by CNN earlier in the day.
Melanson and Anderson were ousted only after a few months on the job, the report said, adding that it was unclear whether there was a single triggering event that prompted the firings.
(Reporting by Harshita Meenaktshi, Bhanvi Satija and Sneha S K in Bengaluru; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Shinjini Ganguli)
