Their work is no longer helping the common good but it’s not like them hanging out in the office doing nothing would actually accomplish anything…

They are going to be given work that has clear biases to it and if they refuse to do it they get fired. By getting fired it will make it harder for them to work in vaccine research in the future. A public resignation where they can inform not just their bosses but tens of thousands of people about the deplorable status of the government and then get a job in private industry where they can continue working to progress science is a much better use of their time.

This is real life not a game and it’s not like they can install a back door into the computer system to fix everything or they can download the super secret file called “RFKs lies top secret don’t share”. Their work is being suppressed and even if they could somehow get out meaningful work it would just be ignored