New Jersey Is the Latest State to Expand Access to Updated Covid Shots; The New York Times, September 10, 2025

Joseph Goldstein , The New York Times; New Jersey Is the Latest State to Expand Access to Updated Covid Shots

"New Jersey is following the lead of New York and several other states that are rebuffing efforts by the federal government to curtail the number of people eligible to receive the latest vaccines against the coronavirus...

The moves come amid a broader campaign that the Trump administration’s secretary for health and human services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is waging against vaccines — especially shots that use mRNA technology, which was pivotal in the development of the most popular coronavirus shots. H.H.S. has canceled nearly $500 million in federal grants and contracts to develop mRNA vaccines, and scrapped a nearly $600 million contract to develop a vaccine against the bird flu.

Mr. Kennedy’s hand-selected members of a government advisory panel also withdrew longstanding recommendations for flu shots that contain an ingredient that the anti-vaccine movement has falsely linked to autism...

In addition to New York and New Jersey, Colorado, Massachusetts, New Mexico and Pennsylvania are among other states that have issued similar orders...

Several states controlled by Democrats, including California, Oregon and Washington, are exploring a range of efforts to promote all vaccines, including the formation of a health alliance that would make recommendations independent from those of the federal government."

‘Public health is in trouble,’ says high-ranking CDC leader who resigned in protest; PBS News, August 28, 2025

Amna Nawaz, Aznar Merchant , PBS News; ‘Public health is in trouble,’ says high-ranking CDC leader who resigned in protest

"Amna Nawaz:

• So let's just start with your decision. Why did you feel the need to resign?

• Dr. Debra Houry:

  It was such a tough decision. I love the CDC. The work we do is so important.

  But I had just felt we had reached a tipping point when it came to our science and our data and being able to do the work we needed to do. I was concerned about the future of CDC and my ability to be a leader at the CDC and to do what was needed to be done on the inside. I thought my voice and the voice of my colleagues that also resigned with me would be more powerful on the outside.

• Amna Nawaz:

  What does reaching that tipping point, as you put it, mean to you?

  You saw Dr. Monarez's lawyers reference the unscientific and reckless directives. What does that mean to you?

  • Dr. Debra Houry:

    Yes, so we have an immunization committee meeting coming up in a few weeks. And many of us, myself included, were concerned about some of the recommendations might walk back vaccines in our country.

    To me, that's one of the tipping points. I think another tipping point is just the loss of Dr. Monarez. We hadn't had a CDC director for several months. When she came on board, she brought scientific rigor and some new ideas around public comment and how to really make sure data drove the decisions.

    When she had done some of these changes, she was brought to the secretary's office for discussion. And, at that point, I became concerned that she wouldn't be able to implement changes that were needed at CDC, and without that leadership, it would just leave us vulnerable again. And I thought that was the point to say, enough is enough and to really raise that Bat Signal that public health and CDC is in trouble.

    
    

    • Amna Nawaz:

      You have also said previously that her firing makes it easier for Secretary Kennedy's appointees to change vaccine recommendations. You just mentioned fearing a walk-back in some of those vaccine policies.

      What does that mean specifically? What could we see ahead?

    • Dr. Debra Houry:

      So, if we don't have a CDC director, and if there's not an acting CDC director, then the secretary would sign recommendations like he did for the last ACIP, or vaccine committee, meeting.

      So things like the COVID vaccine or hepatitis B vaccine, they could choose to change ages on it or the populations that have access to it. I'm just concerned about changing vaccine access in our country and that we need to focus more on the safety and effectiveness of vaccines, shared decision-making around vaccines, and not talking about misinformation around vaccines.

      
      

      • Amna Nawaz:

        And changes to things like the hepatitis B vaccine, are those conversations you were a part of during your time there? Those are being discussed?

      • Dr. Debra Houry:

        So I know that the work groups have been asked to look at hepatitis B. They're in the middle of pulling a systematic review together right now.

        So I would imagine that means they will be discussed. My concern is, we have pulled evidence reviews together before for the ACIP meetings, that we had one that was pulled down and not discussed. I think it's really important when we do work at CDC for our data, our science and our evidence reviews to be publicly posted, so the public can also review them and understand.

        And, to me, that is transparency and something we were trying to move towards, particularly with the secretary's commitment to radical transparency. That would mean having publicly available data and documents."

Measles cases are surging in Europe and the US. This is what the anti-vax conspiracy theory has brought us; The Guardian, July 14, 2025

Zoe Williams , The Guardian; Measles cases are surging in Europe and the US. This is what the anti-vax conspiracy theory has brought us

"The effects of the MMR controversy, specifically, are revealing themselves now, nearly 30 years later: measles cases in Europe are at the highest levels in 25 years; in the US, cases are at a 33-year-high; last week it was reported that a child in Liverpool had died having contracted measles. It’s unknown whether the child was vaccinated (no vaccine can guarantee complete immunity) and it doesn’t matter – it wouldn’t make it any less tragic if that child’s parents had been caught in the swirl of misinformation, or any more tragic if they hadn’t. And it wouldn’t be germane anyway: everybody is better protected when everybody is vaccinated. This is never a decision you are making just for yourself.

It’s probably the most depressing conspiracy theory there is, not because the impacts are so much graver than some cranks who believe the Earth to be flat, but because vaccination is the most concrete proof of how much we rely on one another’s care and rationality. That’s true beyond disease – we also need each other for democracy, science, culture, civic life and everything – but in no other area can you see that, count it and put it on a graph."

Top Democrat Blames RFK Jr. for ‘Emergency’ Measles Outbreak; The Daily Beast, July 11, 2025

Sarah Ewall-Wice , The Daily Beast ; Top Democrat Blames RFK Jr. for ‘Emergency’ Measles Outbreak

"“Under your tutelage as Secretary, you have undermined vaccines, gutted public health funding, and dismantled core federal protections meant to keep Americans safe,” Schumer wrote. 

“By destabilizing the nation’s infectious disease response infrastructure via conducting mass layoffs including infectious disease scientists, indiscriminately issuing careless and devastating grant freezes and rescissions, and politicizing the overhaul of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), you have walked our country into the nation’s largest measles outbreak in 33 years,” he continued.

The senator noted that the record number of measles cases comes 25 years after measles was eliminated in 2000, but cases have been on the rise amid an increase in vaccine skepticism."

Medical Societies Sue Kennedy and H.H.S. Over Vaccine Advice; The New York Times, July 7, 2025

Apoorva Mandavilli, The New York Times; Medical Societies Sue Kennedy and H.H.S. Over Vaccine Advice

 "Six leading medical organizations filed a lawsuit on Monday against Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health secretary, and the federal Department of Health and Human Services, charging that recent decisions limiting access to vaccines were unscientific and harmful to the public.

The suit, filed in federal court in western Massachusetts, seeks to restore Covid vaccines to the list of recommended immunizations for healthy children and pregnant women.

Mr. Kennedy has been on a “decades-long mission” to undermine vaccines and to portray them as more dangerous than the illnesses they are designed to prevent, said Richard H. Hughes IV, a lawyer who teaches vaccine law at George Washington University and is leading the effort.

“The secretary’s intentions are clear,” Mr. Hughes said: “He aims to destroy vaccines.”

The plaintiffs include the American Public Health Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the American College of Physicians, the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine and the Massachusetts Public Health Alliance."

Kennedy Withdraws U.S. Funding Pledge to International Vaccine Agency; The New York Times, June 25, 2025

Stephanie Nolen , The New York Times; Kennedy Withdraws U.S. Funding Pledge to International Vaccine Agency

"The U.S. health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has moved to undermine public immunization programs in the United States, took his efforts global on Wednesday, accusing the leading international vaccine organization of having “ignored the science” in immunizing children around the world.

In confrontational remarks sent by video to global leaders who had gathered to support the organization, Gavi, Mr. Kennedy said the United States would withdraw its financial support for the group’s work purchasing vaccines for children in poor countries...

In the video, which was played in the last minutes of the summit, Mr. Kennedy accused Gavi’s leaders of being selective in their use of science to support vaccine choices, and said that the United States would not deliver on a $1.2 billion pledge made by the Biden administration until the organization changed its processes...

In a statement, Gavi’s leaders rejected the suggestion that its vaccine purchases were driven by anything other than the best available evidence.

“Any decision made by Gavi with regards to its vaccine portfolio is made in alignment with recommendations by the World Health Organization’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), a group of independent experts that reviews all available data through a rigorous, transparent and independent process,” Gavi’s statement said. “This ensures Gavi investments are grounded in the best available science and public health priorities.”

Dr. Atul Gawande, a surgeon who led global health work in the Biden administration, called Mr. Kennedy’s remarks “stunning and calamitous.”"

See Vaccine Recommendations Backed by Science in These Handy Charts; Scientific American, June 25, 2025

 JEN CHRISTIANSEN & MEGHAN BARTELS EDITED BY SARAH LEWIN FRASIER , Scientific American; See Vaccine Recommendations Backed by Science in These Handy Charts

"Vaccines are a marvel of modern medicine: the carefully tested and regulated technologies teach people’s immune systems how to fight off potentially fatal infections, saving both lives and health care costs.

But for as long as vaccines have existed, people have opposed them, and in recent years the antivaccine movement has gained visibility and power. Now the Department of Health and Human Services is led by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.—an environmental lawyer with no medical training and a history of antivaccine activism. And these lifesaving medical interventions are coming under threat.

Access to COVID vaccines this fall is already expected to be limited to people aged 65 years or older and to those with underlying health conditions that make them more vulnerable to severe disease. And in June Kennedy dismissed all 17 sitting members of a crucial vaccine oversight group, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which, in the past, has made independent, science-based recommendations on vaccine access for people in the U.S. The dismissals came just weeks before the panel’s next scheduled meeting; Kennedy appointed eight new members in advance of the meeting, which is still set to begin on June 25.

As a public resource, Scientific American has created graphics outlining the vaccines recommended by ACIP as of its final meeting in 2024.

Vaccine recommendations have always been in flux as new products have been developed and continuing research has suggested better practices: The COVID pandemic required brand-new vaccines for a novel virus, for example. And in the U.S., the stunning success of the HPV (human papillomavirus) vaccine led to its recommendation for everyone aged 26 or younger, meanwhile the oral polio vaccine was discontinued in favor of the inactivated injected vaccine.

But traditionally, these decisions have been made by scientists based on solid research done within the confines of accepted ethical practices. These principles mean, for example, that a vaccine’s side effects are carefully monitored and evaluated against its immune benefit and that potential replacement vaccines are tested against their predecessors, not—as Kennedy has proposed—an inert placebo that would leave people vulnerable to an infection that doctors already have the tools to combat."

Many Older People Embrace Vaccines. Research Is Proving Them Right.; The New York Times, June 14, 2025

Paula Span, The New York Times ; Many Older People Embrace Vaccines. Research Is Proving Them Right.

[Kip Currier: Read my previous post. Then reflect on this New York Times article highlighting the benefits and promise of vaccine-related research. We as individuals and members of societies have so much to lose as a result of the anti-science policy positions and decisions of RFK, Jr. and this Trump administration.

Consider the documented benefits of vaccine research throughout prior decades that lead to revolutionary medical advances like vaccines for Polio, Measles, Mumps, Rubella, Pertussis, Hepatitis, Shingles, HPV, MPox, COVID, and more.]

[Excerpt]

"For older adults who express more confidence in vaccine safety than younger groups, the past few months have brought some welcome research. Studies have found important benefits from a newer vaccine and enhanced versions of older ones, and one vaccine may confer a major bonus that nobody had foreseen.

The new studies are coming at a fraught political moment. The nation’s health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has long disparaged certain vaccines, calling them unsafe and saying that the government officials who regulate them are compromised and corrupt.

This week, the secretary fired a panel of scientific advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, replacing them with some who have been skeptical of vaccines. But so far, Mr. Kennedy has not tried to curb access to the shots for older Americans.

The evidence that vaccines are beneficial remains overwhelming."

US experts fear all vaccines at risk as Trump officials target mRNA jabs; The Guardian, June 14, 2025

Melody Schreiber, The Guardian ; US experts fear all vaccines at risk as Trump officials target mRNA jabs

[Kip Currier: How tragic that so many will suffer preventable ailments and some will die needlessly because of vaccine misinformation and disinformation and conspiracy theories fueled by quack science.]

[Excerpt]

"As top US health officials turn against some mRNA vaccines, experts fear for the country’s preparedness for the next pandemic and worry that other vaccines will be targeted next.

Donald Trump’s administration recently canceled a $766m award to Moderna on the research and development of H5N1 bird flu vaccines, and officials have announced new restrictions and regulations for Covid mRNA vaccines – actions that signal a move away from the breakthrough technology.

These changes add to other vaccine-related shakeups at health agencies, including layoffs and resignations of top vaccine officials and the abrupt termination of HIV vaccine research.

On Monday, Robert F Kennedy Jr, secretary of health and human services, announced he was disbanding the independent advisory committee on vaccines for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

“I think mRNA vaccines are particularly at risk, although I think all vaccines are at risk,” said Paul Offit, professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine.

“I think that this administration will do everything it can to make vaccines less available, less affordable and more feared.”"

How the intellectual property monopoly has impeded an effective response to Covid-19; The Conversation, February 14, 2022

 Salam Alshareef; The Conversation ; How the intellectual property monopoly has impeded an effective response toCovid-19

"As of October 2021, only 0.7% of all manufactured vaccine doses had gone to low-income countries. Manufacturers had delivered 47 times as many doses to high-income countries as they had to low-income countries.

Since its inception, COVAX, the UN-backed initiative dedicated to promoting access to Covid vaccines, has struggled to obtain doses. It recently passed the 1 billion doses delivered – half way to its goal of delivering 2 billion doses by the end of 2021. Indeed, AstraZeneca, Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson have delivered between 0% and 39% of their already inadequate commitments to COVAX in 2021.

The Global Commission for Post-Pandemic Policy, meanwhile, estimates that while Asia and Europe will be able to fully vaccinate 80% of their populations by March 2022 and North America by May 2022, Africa will not reach 80% at current rates until April 2025."