Despite running into legal hurdles last month in his efforts to rebuild the U.S. vaccine infrastructure, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. continues to reshape the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Vaccine Advisory Committee in a way that alarms some experts.
In the new charter for the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), the group’s focus, which helps advise the CDC on vaccine schedules and recommendations, appears to shift more toward concerns about vaccine safety and side effects.
In particular, the panel will now work to identify “gaps in vaccine safety research, including post-vaccination side effects.” This language is new in the updated charter and is likely to appease vaccine skeptics. They have long used the potential for vaccine injury and false links to the development of neurological disorders such as autism to further their cause.
The group will also be specifically tasked with considering new vaccine platforms, such as mRNA shots, which have been a frequent issue in anti-vaccine rhetoric in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Another major change in the Charter is a result of the goodwill of ACIP members.
While the committee will continue to accept members with expertise in medicine, vaccines, immunization practices, and immunology, the type of know-how ACIP is seeking will also include knowledge of toxicology, pediatric neurodevelopment, recovery “from severe vaccine injury,” and at least one person with insight into the “consumer perspective” or social and community-focused aspects of immunization programs.
An HHS spokesperson rejected the idea that the charter update was a meaningful change for the commission, telling CNN it was an effort to meet “routine legal requirements” and not part of a “broader policy shift.”
Still, the charter update hasn’t convinced some of RFK Jr.’s critics in the medical community. In a statement, Dr. Ronald G. Nahas, president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, said the new document is “another alarming action by Secretary Kennedy that will further dismantle America’s vaccine infrastructure, spread misinformation and confusion about vaccines, and lead to decreased uptake of vaccines by an already confused and distrustful public.”
The issuance of this Charter marks another turn in ACIP’s dramatic chapter of the past year. Last June, RFK Jr. purged the committee’s entire roster in favor of a fresh start, arguing that he was “prioritizing restoring public trust over any specific pro- or anti-vaccine agenda.”
What followed was a fierce backlash from the medical community, including a lawsuit from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), which ultimately dealt a major blow to RFK Jr.’s vaccine review.
Last month, a judge ruled that key parts of the HHS secretary’s vaccine plan were implemented illegally, pointing specifically to the appointment of ACIP and the CDC’s review of the vaccination schedule.
The decision reportedly resulted in ACIP being frozen and one of the panel’s high-profile members leaving the panel.
