The federal government is officially back to work, and unfortunately, so is Robert F. Kennedy Jr.\u2019s influence over the country\u2019s public health. Early next month, a panel of outside advisors assembled by Kennedy will meet once again and probably take a sledgehammer to more vaccines.<\/p>\n
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently posted the draft agenda<\/a> for the next meeting of its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, scheduled for December 4 and 5. Among other things, ACIP plans to discuss the childhood vaccination schedule as well as \u201ccontaminants\u201d in vaccines. Though it\u2019s not exactly clear what ACIP will vote on during this meeting, some of its members will likely try to remove the decades-old recommendation that children be vaccinated against hepatitis B starting at birth\u2014a decision that even some GOP lawmakers are trying to prevent.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to make America healthy, and you don\u2019t start by stopping recommendations that have made us substantially healthier,\u201d Senator Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) told<\/a> CBS News\u2019 Face the Nation in an interview released\u00a0Sunday.<\/p>\n The hijacked ACIP <\/p>\n Earlier this year, Kennedy unilaterally dismissed all 17 members of the ACIP, the panel of outside experts that helps guide the CDC\u2019s vaccine policies. He then quickly added new advisors<\/a>, many of whom\u2014like Kennedy himself\u2014have a\u00a0history<\/a>\u00a0of spreading misinformation about vaccines.<\/p>\n In its two meetings to date, the rejiggered ACIP has issued several recommendations welcomed by the anti-vaccination movement. It moved to ban the few remaining vaccines<\/a> that contained thimerosal, for instance, an ingredient that antivaxxers have long accused of causing autism with dubious evidence. Though thimerosal was removed from most vaccines as a precaution in the early 2000s, studies since have failed<\/a> to find any link to autism, and\u00a0autism rates have only continued to rise. The ACIP also called for children under four to no longer receive<\/a> the combination measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella vaccine (MMRV), a decision that the previous CDC had left up to parents.<\/p>\n These decisions, and the ACIP\u2019s general shift away from science-backed evaluation, have helped fuel the internal collapse of the CDC. In late August, RFK Jr. fired former CDC director Susan Monarez just four weeks into her role, reportedly because she refused to sign off on the ACIP\u2019s recommendations without conducting her own review; soon after, much of the CDC\u2019s senior leadership resigned in protest.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n So far, the ACIP\u2019s worst decisions have been limited in their scope. Few vaccines today include thimerosal, and most families weren\u2019t vaccinating their very young children with the MMRV shot. But the potential removal of universal at-birth hepatitis B vaccination threatens to be its most sweeping and damaging change yet.<\/p>\n Unscientific fears <\/p>\n Hepatitis B is spread through direct contact with bodily fluids. In adults, it\u2019s usually transmitted via sex or by sharing contaminated needles. But the virus can also be passed from an infected mother to the child during childbirth.<\/p>\n Though a hepatitis B infection can be managed with antivirals if it becomes chronic, there is no curative treatment currently. Most children with hepatitis B will have it for the rest of their lives, and about a quarter will experience serious health problems, including cirrhosis and liver cancer.<\/p>\n Thirty years ago, ACIP and the CDC began to recommend that everyone receive the hepatitis B vaccine when young, eventually moving towards at-birth dosing for the first shot. This strategy was only adopted after previous attempts to just vaccinate the highest-risk groups failed to significantly lower cases. And since its implementation, rates of hepatitis B, especially in children, have steadily fallen in the U.S. The vaccine is also safe, with its most serious side effects, like anaphylaxis, being exceptionally rare and manageable with proper monitoring.<\/p>\n At the last ACIP meeting in September, CDC staff argued in support of at-birth vaccination and warned that more children would almost certainly develop hepatitis B if the policy was removed. Both sessions of the ACIP ran long, and at the very last minute\u2014amidst lots of confusion<\/a>\u00a0about what the members were actually voting on\u2014the ACIP unexpectedly chose<\/a> to table its planned vote on hepatitis B. Given the inclusion of hepatitis B on Friday\u2019s agenda, however, it appears that reprieve was short-lived.<\/p>\n The inclusion of the childhood vaccine schedule on Thursday\u2019s agenda is also plenty concerning. Antivaxxers have made no secret about their desire to tear the schedule to shreds if they could. The Children\u2019s Health Defense, the anti-vaccination group founded by RFK Jr., hosted its \u201cMoment of Truth\u201d conference earlier this month. During the conference, Mark Gorton, president of the MAHA Institute\u2014a group founded<\/a> to bolster Kennedy\u2019s \u201cMake America Healthy\u201d movement\u2014called<\/a> for the \u201cchildhood vaccination schedule to be eliminated.\u201d<\/p>\n As before, the reformed ACIP has not revealed the contents of its votes scheduled for this next meeting. So it\u2019s still up in the air just how far its members will go in trying to change the schedule. But there\u2019s certainly no reason to be optimistic about what lies ahead for the country\u2019s public health under the reign of RFK Jr.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The federal government is officially back to work, and unfortunately, so is Robert F. 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