The new vaccine advisors from US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. meet next week, but their agenda suggests they will skip some expected topics, including voting for Covidshot, while gaining long-standing targets for anti-vaxin groups.
The Advisory Committee on Vaccination Practices recommends how to use the country's vaccine, how to schedule vaccines for children, and adult shot advice. Last week, Kennedy suddenly rejected an existing panel of 17 experts and carefully selected eight alternatives, including several anti-vaccine voices.
The agenda for the new committee's first meeting, posted Wednesday, shows that it will be shorter than expected. The Covid Shots discussion opens a session, but the agenda does not list any votes on it. Instead, the committee votes for the fall flu vaccination, RSV vaccinations for pregnant women and children, and the use of a preservative named Timelosal, which is in a subset of influenza shots.
It is not clear who wrote the agenda. The committee chair was not named and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not comment.
The committee will not take up HPV or meningococcal vaccines
What's missing from the agenda are some frequently studied vaccine policy proposals that advisors are to consider this month, including shots against HPV and meningococcal bacteria, said Dr. Susan Cresley, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Instead, she said the committee is talking about subjects that “science is settled.”
“Every American should ask ourselves how and why we got here, where leaders are promoting their own agenda rather than protecting our people and our communities,” she said. She worried that it was “part of a deliberate agenda for inserting dangerous, harmful and unnecessary fears about vaccines into the process.”
The committee will recommend how vaccines approved by the Food and Drug Administration should be used. Recommendations have traditionally been sent to the Centers for Directors of Disease Control and Prevention. Historically, almost everything has been accepted and used by insurance companies in determining which vaccines to cover.
However, the CDC had no directors and the committee's recommendations went to Kennedy.
Thimeromonkeys have been a long-standing target of anti-vaccine activists
In the early 20th century, thimeromonal was added to certain vaccines to prevent bacterial contamination in multi-dose vials, making it safer and more accessible. It is a very small amount, but it is a form of mercury, which began to raise doubts in the 1990s.
Kennedy, the leading voice in the anti-vaccine movement before becoming President Donald Trump's health secretary — has long believed thimerosal had a connection with autism, accusing the government of hiding the dangers.
Post-study studies found no evidence that thimeromonkeys cause autism. However, all vaccines manufactured for the US market since 2001 and routinely recommended for children under the age of 6, do not contain only thimeromonkeys or trace amounts, except for the inactivated influenza vaccine.
Thimerosal is currently only shown in multi-dose flu shot vials and is not a single shot package for most of today's flu shots.
Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at the Philadelphia Children's Hospital, said that targeting thimeromonkeys could force manufacturers to switch to single-dose vials.
A group of doctors opposes Kennedy's vaccine move
Last week, 30 organizations asked insurers to continue paying for the Covid vaccine for pregnant women after Kennedy told the group that the shot was no longer recommended.
A group of doctors also opposed changes to Kennedy's vaccine committee. The new members of his choice have become conservative beloved as they have studied mRNA vaccine technology, criticised the Covid vaccine, top critics of the closure during the pandemic era, and leader of a group widely considered the cause of vaccine misinformation.
The American Academy of Pediatrics has long published its own vaccination recommendations. It coincides with what the government has recommended over the last few decades. But they asked if they might fork quickly in response to potential changes in government vaccination recommendations, Cresley said. “Nothing is off the table.”
“We will do whatever it takes to make sure every child in every community has a vaccine that is worthy of being healthy and safe,” she said.
