[This article first appeared at Common Dreams on June 15, 2025.]
RFK Jr. STRIKES AGAIN – AT AMERICANS’ HEALTH
Someone should have told Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy that President Donald Trump’s mishandling of the last pandemic probably cost him the presidency in 2020. Building on his longstanding anti-vaxxing crusade, Kennedy has followed a three-step program that will worsen the next outbreak.
Step 1: Reduce vaccine availability. Three weeks ago, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) – one of Kennedy’s HHS agencies – announced that for healthy Americans under 65, COVID vaccines will not be approved until they pass large scale and time-consuming clinical trials. That is a daunting obstacle.
Step 2: Reduce vaccine eligibility. The following week, Kennedy announced that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would no longer recommend the COVID vaccine for children and pregnant women. Within days, the CDC had to walk it back somewhat, stating that whether to vaccinate a child should be the product of “shared decision-making” involving parents and physicians. But pregnant women remain in the limbo world of “no recommendation.” In any event, the negative impact on overall public health will be enormous.
Step 3: Eliminate vaccine expertise. On June 9, Kennedy fired the entire CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) – all 17 of them. This committee of outside experts reviews the most recent data on all vaccines to assess safety, efficacy, and clinical need. It develops a recommended guidance schedule for all vaccines, including seasonal flu shots and COVID boosters. Physicians rely on that guidance in counseling patients, and insurance companies and government programs use it to determine the vaccines they will cover. Committee members received their termination notices via email sent two hours after Kennedy announced their firing in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
With Kennedy’s selection of his first eight replacements on June 11, we’re getting a sense of the disaster that will accompany Step 4.
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The Belly of the Beast 