RFK Jr. changes Covid vaccine advice

A version of this text first appeared in CNBC’s Healthy Returns newsletter, which brings the newest health-care news straight to your inbox. Subscribe here to receive future editions.

A wave of shock is sweeping the scientific and medical world after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to stop recommending routine Covid-19 vaccines for healthy children and healthy pregnant women.

Kennedy, a outstanding vaccine skeptic, on Tuesday said the Covid shot has been faraway from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s really useful immunization schedule for those groups. 

“Last 12 months, the Biden administration urged healthy children to get yet one more Covid shot, despite the dearth of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children,” Kennedy said in a video on X. He offered no scientific evidence to justify the change to the recommendations. 

It’s Kennedy’s latest move to vary and potentially undermine vaccinations within the U.S. since he took the helm on the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the federal agencies that regulate and recommend shots. 

It comes every week after Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary set stricter standards for approving shots for healthy Americans. 

Some health experts say the dropped advice could have devastating consequences, particularly for pregnant women and their babies. 

Each are considered to be at higher risk of severe complications from Covid-19 infections, in accordance with the CDC’s website. That may include preterm labor and birth, heart injury, blood clots and kidney damage amongst pregnant women. 

“As ob-gyns who treat patients every single day, we now have seen firsthand how dangerous COVID-19 infection could be while pregnant and for newborns who rely on maternal antibodies from the vaccine for cover,” Steven Fleischman, president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said in a press release. 

He emphasized that “the science has not modified.”

“Following this announcement, we’re anxious about our patients in the longer term, who could also be less prone to select vaccination while pregnant despite the clear and definitive evidence demonstrating its profit,” Fleischman said. 

Studies have found that Covid-19 vaccination reduces the danger of hospitalization from the virus for pregnant women and infants younger than 6 months.

Fleischman and other experts also raised concerns about whether patients could have access to vaccines following Kennedy’s decision. The CDC’s advice is crucial since it guides insurance policy on which shots to cover for free of charge to patients.

Medicare and Medicaid require that the really useful vaccines are free for patients. The Reasonably priced Care Act requires private insurers to cover all vaccines really useful by the CDC’s outside committee of vaccine advisors and director. Children without insurance can get free really useful vaccines through the government-run Vaccines for Children Program.

Pfizer and Moderna are charging as much as $150 per dose for his or her respective Covid shots before insurance, in accordance with the CDC’s website. 

“This decision could make it significantly harder for hundreds of thousands of Americans to access vaccines they need for themselves and their families,” Tina Tan, president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, said in a statement.

Tan added that process for Kennedy’s decision breaks with the precedent of letting federal panels of experts publicly debate scientific evidence and vote on immunization practices. A bunch of external advisors to the CDC typically gives vaccine advice to the agency’s director. 

Trump’s nominee to guide the CDC, acting director Susan Monarez, still needs Senate confirmation. 

“This decision bypasses a long-established, evidence-based process used to make sure vaccine safety and ignores the expertise of independent health workers, including members of CDC committees who’re examining the evidence regarding the vaccine to make recommendations for the autumn,” Sean O’Leary, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases, said in a statement. 

He added that the choice could “strip families of selection,” stopping those that need to vaccinate from getting shots.

Be happy to send any suggestions, suggestions, story ideas and data to Annika at annikakim.constantino@nbcuni.com.

Did you hear that? That was the sound of the digital health sector respiration a collective sigh of relief.

Digital physical therapy company Hinge Health debuted on the Recent York Stock Exchange last week in the sector’s first major public exit in several years.