An overview of the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia.
Tami Chappell | Reuters
A crucial panel of the Government of Vaccine Advisors celebrates its first meeting on Wednesday since the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., appointed several vaccines critics for the group.
Earlier this month, Kennedy in a surprising step eliminated and replaced all members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, which advises the centers for disease control and prevention. The group reviews the vaccine data and makes recommendations that determine who is eligible for shots and if insurers must cover them, among other efforts.
ACIP members are independent medical and public experts who make recommendations based on a rigorous scientific review and evidence. It is not clear how Kennedy's new members, given part of their skepticism of immunizations, will affect vaccine policy and availability in the United States.
“Vaccines are not all good or bad,” said Dr. Martin Kullldorff, the new Acip chair, in the opening comments.
“If you believe that all vaccines are safe and effective and want them all, or if you believe that all vaccines are dangerous and do not want any of them, then it does not have much use for us. You already know what you want,” said Kulldorff, a bioestatistics and epidemiologist who questioned the blockages and other public health measures at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“But if you want to know what vaccines are suitable for you and your children and what ages, then we will provide evidence -based recommendations,” he added.
During a full day meeting on Wednesday in Atlanta, the panel will evaluate the data on COVID-19 vaccines and the RSV shots, with a vote on the recommendations for the latter. The group will be convened on Thursday to review the data on the flu and other diseases.
The CDC director has to sign these recommendations to become an official policy.
Kulldorff said that ACIP will create new working groups, which are personnel who review the published and unpublished data and develop recommendation options to present to the Committee. A new working group will review the children's vaccine calendar, while another will examine the shots that have not been subject to reviews in more than seven years, he said.
The last group can examine the vaccine universally recommended by hepatitis B and ask if it is “wise” to administer the shot to each newborn before leaving the hospital, among other topics, Kullldorff added.
“This was a regular practice of ACIP, but it has not been done thoroughly and systematicly. We will change that,” Kullldorff said.
Before the meeting, one of Kennedy's new names renounced the panel.
In a statement, an HHS spokesman said Dr. Michael Ross withdrew from ACIP during a mandatory review of each member's financial holdings, without providing more details. It is not clear what your financial holdings are.
Ross is a clinical professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology and has served in another CDC advisory panel centered on breast and cervical cancer.
What new panel members have said about vaccines?
Kennedy's eight new members include some known vaccines critics, such as Dr. Robert Malone.
Malone invoices himself as having played a key role in the creation of HRNM vaccines, but has won a large number of followers to make statements without foundation and apologies about COVID-19 shots.
Another new member, Resef Levi, has pressed to stop giving HRNA vaccines, falsely claiming in an X position that causes “serious damage, including death, especially among young people.”
Another member, Vicky Pebsworth, is a nurse at the Board of the National Vaccine Information Center. This organization has been widely criticized as a leading source of misinformation and fear about immunization.
During Wednesday's meeting, Pebsworth revealed that he has stock funds and health sector that include vaccine manufacturers. But she said that her holdings are under the amount that the Government considers a conflict of interest, which allows her to participate in the ACIP meeting.
Kennedy fired previous members of ACIP for having what he called “conflicts of persistent interests.” But all HHS agencies and their advice panels have had rigorous policies for conflicts of interest, and there have been no related problems for years.
