Latest news with #Kennedy-appointed
Yahoo
19 hours ago
- Health
- Yahoo
RFK Jr. isn't hiding his plans for vaccines. Democrats say it will cost lives.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. isn't shading his big plans for the country's vaccine safety system anymore. The health secretary and longtime vaccine skeptic pledged during his Senate confirmation earlier this year to leave that alone. But at a House health panel hearing Tuesday, Kennedy said there was ample reason to worry some vaccines aren't safe and gave no ground to Democrats who pointed out that most scientists and public health experts vehemently disagree. 'How can you mandate – which effectively is what they do — these products to healthy children without knowing the risk profile?' Kennedy said in explaining why he earlier this month fired 17 members of a CDC vaccine advisory panel and replaced them with eight new members, many of them skeptical of vaccine safety. The hearing was officially about President Donald Trump's fiscal 2026 budget proposal for the Department of Health and Human Services, but Kennedy's testimony came after he rolled back guidance for healthy adults and children to get Covid shots and purged the outside vaccine experts. Some Democrats wanted to focus more on those decisions than Trump's plan to cut the HHS budget by a quarter. They pointed out that studies have consistently upheld vaccine safety and predicted Kennedy's moves would contribute to vaccine skepticism and cost lives. 'It's clear to me that the vast majority of scientists and medical professionals think your views on vaccines are dangerous,' said New Jersey's Frank Pallone, the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee. 'The science is not on your side. I just really think people are going to die as a result of your actions.' After that, things got hot. Kennedy accused Pallone of abandoning people injured by vaccines because of pharmaceutical company campaign contributions. The top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee, Diana DeGette of Colorado, raised a point of order, saying Kennedy had impugned Pallone's integrity and needed to take back his accusation. Kennedy retracted it, but temperatures remained high. Questioned by Democrat Robin Kelly of Illinois about his decision to stop recommending Covid vaccination to pregnant women — a move criticized by doctors' groups — Kennedy didn't give an inch. 'We are no longer recommending it because there is no science supporting the recommendation,' he said, adding that 'study after study shows adverse effects.' One, he said, had found increased risk of miscarriage. Public health experts, including those HHS has cited, say that's not the case. But Kennedy argued that many of the experts on which the government has relied, including those he fired from the vaccine advisory panel, were 'rife with conflicts of interest' with drug companies and had 'committed multiple acts of malpractice.' The new panel of Kennedy-appointed advisers will begin their first meeting tomorrow at the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. They'll review a vaccine preservative, thimerosal, Kennedy has long wanted banned, Covid shots Kennedy has said are the 'deadliest vaccines ever made,' as well as the measles vaccine he has suggested causes autism. Kennedy offered none of the conciliatory tone on vaccines he did when he was seeking the top job at the Department of Health and Human Services or even in more recent congressional hearings, at which he half-heartedly endorsed measles vaccines. Rep. Kim Schrier (D-Wash.) accused Kennedy of lying to Sen. Bill Cassidy, the chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, about his intentions on vaccine policy. Cassidy was the deciding vote on Kennedy's confirmation at the committee level, and the Louisiana Republican said he agreed to vote for Kennedy only after he promised not to upend the nation's decision-making process on vaccines. Kennedy told Schrier he never promised Cassidy he wouldn't make changes to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and a Cassidy spokesperson told POLITICO the senator 'has said publicly that the agreement was about the ACIP process, not the staffing of ACIP.' But Cassidy, in a post to X last night, decried Kennedy's decision to replace the advisory panel members and said the new ones Kennedy had chosen didn't have the right experience for the job. He asked Kennedy to delay the meeting and appoint new members. Schrier, who's a pediatrician, described to Kennedy in graphic ways the effects of some vaccine-preventable diseases in children. 'They cough so hard, they vomit, they run out of air, they break ribs, and if you don't catch it before two weeks, antibiotics don't even work,' she said about the effects of whooping cough in older children. But some Republican lawmakers defended Kennedy for his willingness to challenge conventional wisdom to improve American health outcomes that are among the worst among wealthy countries. 'Thank you again for thinking outside the box. That's what it takes,' said Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) about Kennedy's support for drugmakers' incentives to develop drugs for rare diseases that affect children. Rep. Kat Cammack, another Florida Republican, said Kennedy was 'a disruptor,' adding: 'That's what we need in these times because so many people, especially in Congress, want to maintain the same broken status quo.' Kelly Hooper contributed reporting.
Politico
20 hours ago
- Health
- Politico
RFK Jr. isn't hiding his plans for vaccines. Democrats say it will cost lives.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. isn't shading his big plans for the country's vaccine safety system anymore. The health secretary and longtime vaccine skeptic pledged during his Senate confirmation earlier this year to leave that alone. But at a House health panel hearing Tuesday, Kennedy said there was ample reason to worry some vaccines aren't safe and gave no ground to Democrats who pointed out that most scientists and public health experts vehemently disagree. 'How can you mandate – which effectively is what they do — these products to healthy children without knowing the risk profile?' Kennedy said in explaining why he earlier this month fired 17 members of a CDC vaccine advisory panel and replaced them with eight new members, many of them skeptical of vaccine safety. The hearing was officially about President Donald Trump's fiscal 2026 budget proposal for the Department of Health and Human Services, but Kennedy's testimony came after he rolled back guidance for healthy adults and children to get Covid shots and purged the outside vaccine experts. Some Democrats wanted to focus more on those decisions than Trump's plan to cut the HHS budget by a quarter. They pointed out that studies have consistently upheld vaccine safety and predicted Kennedy's moves would contribute to vaccine skepticism and cost lives. 'It's clear to me that the vast majority of scientists and medical professionals think your views on vaccines are dangerous,' said New Jersey's Frank Pallone, the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee. 'The science is not on your side. I just really think people are going to die as a result of your actions.' After that, things got hot. Kennedy accused Pallone of abandoning people injured by vaccines because of pharmaceutical company campaign contributions. The top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee, Diana DeGette of Colorado, raised a point of order, saying Kennedy had impugned Pallone's integrity and needed to take back his accusation. Kennedy retracted it, but temperatures remained high. Questioned by Democrat Robin Kelly of Illinois about his decision to stop recommending Covid vaccination to pregnant women — a move criticized by doctors' groups — Kennedy didn't give an inch. 'We are no longer recommending it because there is no science supporting the recommendation,' he said, adding that 'study after study shows adverse effects.' One, he said, had found increased risk of miscarriage. Public health experts, including those HHS has cited, say that's not the case. But Kennedy argued that many of the experts on which the government has relied, including those he fired from the vaccine advisory panel, were 'rife with conflicts of interest' with drug companies and had 'committed multiple acts of malpractice.' The new panel of Kennedy-appointed advisers will begin their first meeting tomorrow at the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. They'll review a vaccine preservative, thimerosal, Kennedy has long wanted banned, Covid shots Kennedy has said are the 'deadliest vaccines ever made,' as well as the measles vaccine he has suggested causes autism. Kennedy offered none of the conciliatory tone on vaccines he did when he was seeking the top job at the Department of Health and Human Services or even in more recent Congressional hearings, at which he half-heartedly endorsed measles vaccines. Rep. Kim Schrier (D-Wash.) accused Kennedy of lying to Sen. Bill Cassidy, the chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, about his intentions on vaccine policy. Cassidy was the deciding vote on Kennedy's confirmation at the committee level, and the Louisiana Republican said he agreed to vote for Kennedy only after he promised not to upend the nation's decision-making process on vaccines. Kennedy told Schrier he never promised Cassidy he wouldn't make changes to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and a Cassidy spokesperson told POLITICO the senator 'has said publicly that the agreement was about the ACIP process, not the staffing of ACIP.' But Cassidy, in a post to X last night, decried Kennedy's decision to replace the advisory panel members and said the new ones Kennedy had chosen didn't have the right experience for the job. He asked Kennedy to delay the meeting and appoint new members. Schrier, who's a pediatrician, described to Kennedy in graphic ways the effects of some vaccine-preventable diseases in children. 'They cough so hard, they vomit, they run out of air, they break ribs, and if you don't catch it before two weeks, antibiotics don't even work,' she said about the effects of whooping cough in older children. But some Republican lawmakers defended Kennedy for his willingness to challenge conventional wisdom to improve American health outcomes that are among the worst among wealthy countries. 'Thank you again for thinking outside the box. That's what it takes,' said Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) about Kennedy's support for drugmakers' incentives to develop drugs for rare diseases that affect children. Rep. Kat Cammack, another Florida Republican, said Kennedy was 'a disruptor,' adding: 'That's what we need in these times because so many people, especially in Congress, want to maintain the same broken status quo.' Kelly Hooper contributed reporting.
Politico
2 days ago
- Health
- Politico
Trump's team makes the case for cuts
WASHINGTON WATCH From Capitol Hill to CDC headquarters in Atlanta, this last week of June will yield important clues about the direction of health policy under President Donald Trump — and whether a GOP Congress will go along. On Wednesday, Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine), who's spoken out against global health cuts, will question Russell Vought, director of the White House's Office of Management and Budget, who's spearheaded them. At stake: Trump's request to Congress that it rescind $900 million in funds lawmakers asked the administration to spend on global health this year, including $400 million for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief — which President George W. Bush created more than two decades ago to fight AIDS in lower income countries. Collins told POLITICO earlier this month she wouldn't support cutting PEPFAR, touting it as an initiative that's 'saved literally millions of lives and been extremely effective.' When Vought testified before House appropriators three weeks ago, he said the administration would continue to fund lifesaving treatment, but stood firm on scaling back prevention work. 'It is something that our budget will be very trim on,' Vought said of funding AIDS prevention work, 'because we believe that many of these nonprofits are not geared towards the viewpoints of the administration. And we're $37 trillion in debt. So at some point, the continent of Africa needs to absorb more of the burden of providing this health care.' Follow the money: On Tuesday, the health panel of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will be the latest congressional panel to hear the case for Trump's fiscal 2026 budget, which calls for a cut of more than a quarter in funding for the Department of Health and Human Services starting Oct. 1. Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will testify. In Atlanta: The first meeting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's vaccine advisory panel since Kennedy replaced all its members starts Wednesday. The eight Kennedy-appointed panelists will consider the use of the preservative thimerosal in vaccines. Kennedy wrote a book in 2014 calling for its ban, arguing it causes brain damage and probably autism. The CDC says that's not the case. WELCOME TO FUTURE PULSE This is where we explore the ideas and innovators shaping health care. A metastatic cancer patient's treatment and medical fate are in limbo after the National Institutes of Health cleaved its workforce, The Washington Post reports. Share any thoughts, news, tips and feedback with Danny Nguyen at dnguyen@ Carmen Paun at cpaun@ Ruth Reader at rreader@ or Erin Schumaker at eschumaker@ Want to share a tip securely? Message us on Signal: Dannyn516.70, CarmenP.82, RuthReader.02 or ErinSchumaker.01. TECH MAZE At a meeting Friday, Europe's health ministers agreed to put their weight behind the regulation of social media to protect kids' mental health, our Claudia Chiappa reports from Luxembourg. The agreement calls on countries to consider 'strengthening accurate, reliable, robust and privacy-preserving age verification processes' and 'protecting children from addictive design practices.' Countries should also consider introducing screen-free zones and digital limits within schools, the ministers determined. Why it matters: The push to regulate social media is gaining steam on both sides of the Atlantic as evidence mounts that social media can negatively affect kids. In Washington, lawmakers continue to consider a variety of proposals, from restrictions on addictive design features to age-verification rules. States are already moving forward, with Utah earlier this year requiring age verification by app stores. And California, Connecticut and Maryland have passed laws aimed at regulating website design. What's next? The EU's executive body has launched a study on the impact of social media on kids and excessive screen time on mental health and well-being, which the health ministers hope will bolster the case for regulation.
Politico
7 days ago
- Health
- Politico
Vaccine advisers to review ingredient RFK Jr. has long wanted banned
Before he became health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote a book alleging the vaccine preservative thimerosal likely caused autism and should be banned — a claim that health agencies now under his control have said is unfounded. Next week, Kennedy-appointed advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will consider thimerosal's use in vaccines. The agenda for the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, released Wednesday, says the panel will hold two separate votes: one on 'Influenza Vaccines' and one on influenza vaccines that contain thimerosal. In his 2014 book, Kennedy argued that 'there is a virtually unanimous scientific consensus among the hundreds of research scientists who have published peer-reviewed articles in the field that Thimerosal is immensely toxic to brain tissue' and called for its removal from vaccines. Myriad peer-reviewed scientific studies dispute that there's any link between thimerosal and health harms, and a federal vaccine court rejected arguments alleging a link between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism in the late 2000s. The panel's move to examine thimerosal suggests Kennedy is using it to pursue the ban he's long sought, wrote MedPage Today Editor-in-Chief Jeremy Faust in a commentary. 'Elevating this debunked myth to national policy lends credence to misinformation, and sets the stage for other actions that may undermine vaccine confidence in the United States,' Faust added. Thimerosal continues to be used as a preservative in multi-dose vaccine vials to inhibit germ growth. But its use in FDA-licensed flu vaccines has declined over the last 25 years as manufacturers reformulated their products and shifted to single-use vials. Most of those contain little or no thimerosal, according to the CDC. Spokespeople for Sanofi and Seqirus, the two manufacturers of thimerosal-containing flu vaccines marketed in the U.S., didn't immediately comment on how much of those products they sell domestically versus preservative-free shots. That shift came amid concerns raised in the late 1990s and early 2000s that thimerosal, a mercury-containing compound, could be linked to autism in children. In 1999, the FDA and CDC announced plans to work with manufacturers to reduce or remove thimerosal from vaccines as a precaution. The preservative was largely removed from pediatric vaccines by 2001. Kennedy fired the advisory panel's 17 members last week and replaced them with eight new ones, several of whom have histories of vaccine skepticism. The agenda for the advisory committee's meeting only includes two days, June 25 and 26, but a Federal Register notice says the panel will also meet on June 27. A spokesperson for HHS did not comment on the thimerosal vote or why the agenda for the 27th was not included. No Covid vote: The agenda does not include a vote on Covid-19 vaccines, despite the Federal Register notice saying a vote is planned. Last month, Kennedy updated the CDC's Covid-19 recommendations without a vote from the panel, breaking from tradition. Kennedy removed the recommendation that pregnant women get the shot, and the CDC changed the recommendation for healthy children to 'shared clinical decision making' — meaning children 'may' get vaccinated if their doctors and parents want them to. The HPV vaccine and meningococcal vaccine were also slated for a vote according to the meeting's Federal Register notice, but are not included in the draft agenda.
