Washington DC - President Donald Trump and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) are making "dramatic" changes to the nation's healthcare system, which will soon result in thousands of cut jobs.

On Thursday, the agency announced a number of big plans in the works, which HHS head Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said will "[realign] the organization with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic."

The department will soon fire 10,000 more full-time employees, which they claim will save taxpayers $1.8 billion per year. Divisions within the department will be consolidated from 28 to 15, and the number of regional offices will be reduced from 10 to 5.

HHS will create the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA), which will combine several of its agencies into one, making them "more responsive and efficient."

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The department also promised that the AHA would ensure that "Medicare, Medicaid, and other essential health services remain intact."

According to CNN, HHS sent a formal reduction in force notice to American Federation of Government Employees union leaders on Thursday, with notices to specific employees expected to go out on Friday.

"Over time, bureaucracies like HHS become wasteful and inefficient even when most of their staff are dedicated and competent civil servants," Kennedy argued. "This overhaul will be a win-win for taxpayers and for those that HHS serves."

According to Axios, the administration has already begun making sweeping changes by canceling billions of dollars in grant funding to states, most of which involved funding for substance use disorder support programs and infectious disease prevention, such as resources to battle the Covid-19 pandemic.

In this week alone, HHS has already terminated more than $12 billion in federal grants.

In defense of the move, an HHS spokesperson argued, "The Covid-19 pandemic is over, and HHS will no longer waste billions of taxpayer dollars responding to a non-existent pandemic that Americans moved on from years ago."

"HHS is prioritizing funding projects that will deliver on President Trump's mandate to address our chronic disease epidemic and Make America Healthy Again," the spokesperson added.