A year after changes to federal leadership in the U.S. public health system, a new poll finds that trust in public health agencies has dropped dramatically. Only 50% of U.S. adults say they trust health recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), compared to 77% in spring 2025. The fraction who say they trust their state health department has declined from 80% to 66%, and the fraction who say they trust their local public health department has fallen from 82% to 70%.
The poll, One Year In: Public Views of a Changing Public Health Landscape, was conducted by Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the de Beaumont Foundation's Public Health Listening Lab from March 19 to April 1, 2026, among a probability-based, nationally representative sample of 2,205 U.S. adults ages 18 and older.
Trust in public health agencies takes a tumble
Trust in CDC health recommendations remained relatively stable in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic but has fallen precipitously in the last year. Trust hovered around 75% from 2022 to 2025; a year into new federal leadership, it declined to 50%. The fraction of the public saying they trust CDC health recommendations includes about a third (38%) who say they trust them "somewhat" and a small share (12%) who say they trust them "a great deal."
