However, Annika Barber, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University who is a member of an NIH study section slated to meet Feb. 20 and 21, said she was told the meeting was not canceled. "At least for now, it seems like this [scientific review officer] thinks that we will be meeting, and I was able to book my travel through the NIH World Travel website this afternoon and an Amtrak ticket was issued, so the NIH did pay for a train ticket, which also seems promising," Barber said.

"The executive branch is a hierarchy," Grossman said. "Whether stated publicly or not, every new administration wants important commitments and positions to wait until new teams are in place and some semblance of hierarchy restored."

"It's not unusual for a new administration to want to centralize communication," said Richard Besser, CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and former acting director of CDC. "It is unusual to pause all communication from an agency where one of its critical responsibilities is keeping the public informed," he added.

Chrissie Juliano, executive director of the Big Cities Health Coalition, said state and city health officials rely on CDC notices to make decisions for their communities, like when to increase flu testing or which disease symptoms to be on the lookout for. While a lot of that information can be delayed a few days, Juliano said she hopes the administration has a plan for disseminating more pressing public health information, especially relating to the ongoing bird flu outbreak.

"Can something like the bird flu turn on a dime in 10 days?" Juliano said. "Yes. I would hope that if those signals are seen at the federal level, information is going to get out."

It's also possible that canceling scientific meetings could have repercussions in the future.

"Peer review via study sections is required by law in order for the NIH to disburse most of the $40 billion annual extramural budget," said Norman Sharpless, a former director of the National Cancer Institute. "If study sections and advisory council meetings are postponed for more than even a brief period, this will likely lead to interruptions in grant funding, which is bad for U.S. biomedical research."

"Anything that disrupts study sections for a period of time, from government shutdowns to major weather events, can backlog and slow down the whole system, especially since study section members tend to be busy people who can be hard to schedule. Virtual study sections make it easier, but it can be disruptive," said Carrie Wolinetz, chair of the health bioscience innovations practice at Lewis-Burke Associates and former senior adviser at NIH.

"This is super stressful because of the uncertainty of not knowing how long these cancellations be in effect. If study sections don't meet on time, then that could delay grants being distributed, which affects the ability of labs to pay their students and postdocs and staff. In some cases, if there was a gap in funding, it could result in someone either not being hired at all or having to be laid off," said Rebecca Pompano, a chemist and biomedical engineer at the University of Virginia whose training session for a study section was canceled 20 minutes before it was scheduled to start.

"With [government] shutdowns, we all know eventually it will reopen, and so it's always seen as temporary," Pompano added. "But this one is more stressful because there's been a lot of talk from [Robert F. Kennedy Jr.] about overhauling the NIH extensively."