Greetings from San Diego. I’m Jonathan Worthen, West Coast Biotechnology & Life Sciences reporter. Today, we have a great lineup featuring details on the difficult choices federal officials face regarding vaccine policy, the search for a permanent director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and how changing regulations are making it harder for patients to secure innovative treatments for deadly intestinal infections.
On a personal note, I’m going on maternity leave for a few months starting today, so it’ll be a while before you see my byline again. In the meantime, keep reading great articles from my talented colleagues. I look forward to watching them work from afar (when I’m not busy with my kids).
How will federal authorities react to the ruling delaying RFK Jr.’s vaccine review?
Ilya Nouberge/Getty Images
Donald Trump has kept his campaign promise to have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “run amok on health issues,” appointing the outspoken vaccine critic to head the federal Department of Health, where he reconstituted a key vaccine advisory committee. But a federal judge recently ruled that President Kennedy’s reorganization of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and changes to the childhood vaccination schedule were likely illegal. And federal authorities must now decide how to respond to court orders.
It’s a difficult choice, writes colleague Chelsea Siluzzo. The White House has largely been a strong supporter of President Kennedy’s health policies, but pollsters say vaccine policy changes are unpopular with voters and this is also an election year. A person familiar with the situation told Chelsea that the administration has not yet decided whether to appeal the ruling. Another option would be to reconfigure ACIP again.
For now, the committee’s preliminary recommendations have been overridden by court orders, including postponing the administration of hepatitis B vaccine at birth to mothers who test negative for the virus and splitting up the combined measles, mumps, rubella and varicella vaccinations. However, ACIP remains in limbo, although Kennedy or the CDC director (whose seat remains vacant for now) could make their own vaccine recommendations.
Inside the high-stakes search for a new CDC director
Speaking of the CDC Director vacancy, Chris Klomp, Medicare Secretary and rising star at the federal Department of Health, is playing a key role in filling one of the Trump administration’s most controversial and important open roles. Last week at the STAT Breakthrough Summit East in New York, Klomp explained how he is tackling this challenge.
“I’m looking for someone with experience, deep expertise, and impregnable moral integrity who is qualified to lead an incredibly complex and essential government agency,” he said. Klomp lamented the decline in trust in the CDC, saying the problem predates the current administration. The medical director added that he has been vetting candidates over Zoom and in person, and that Kennedy has been involved in the process.
He told STAT that about six candidates have passed “more advanced interview stages.” I don’t have much time at the moment. If the White House does not name a new director by Wednesday, it will not be able to keep Jay Bhattacharyya as acting director. Read more from STAT Editor-in-Chief Rick Burke and Washington Correspondent Daniel Payne.
There is a trust issue in medicine. AI is making the situation even worse
Artificial intelligence companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic are making significant inroads into the medical field, convinced that their tools can help patients and healthcare professionals. But some of these systems have already proven to be error-prone, and the race to implement them could further erode trust in health care, physician-researcher Oni Blackstock argues in a STAT lead opinion.
Blackstock wrote that the medical field is a natural target for AI companies because it has what algorithms need most: data and lots of it. However, public opinion polls show that the public has little confidence that the health system will use AI responsibly, with 58% of respondents in a 2025 survey saying they were confident that the health system would not be harmed by AI tools.
“What needs to change is who contributes to decisions about how AI tools are purchased, managed, and used,” Blackstock wrote, adding that patients who experience discrimination in healthcare are the least likely to trust the healthcare system to use AI responsibly. “Patients and community members need formal decision-making roles, not just advisory positions.”
Stricter FDA regulations have turned fecal transplants into an adventure
Gilda Jones/CDC
For patients with severe Clostridioides difficile infection, one person’s stool is another person’s treasure. Fecal transplants amount to a hard reset of the gut microbiome and can be a lifesaver for people whose colons are infested with toxin-spewing bacteria. But strict rules imposed by the Food and Drug Administration on stool banks are making these treatments increasingly difficult to access, writes STAT’s Eric Budman.
In 2022 and 2023, two companies won FDA approval for human waste-derived drugs to prevent C. diff. recurrence. Shortly after, the agency cracked down on OpenBiome, a nonprofit organization that acts like a fecal blood bank, ending its long-standing practice of not enforcing certain regulatory requirements. The mail bank immediately stopped shipping samples.
Tighter regulations were a big problem for Blanca Morales and her son Mundo, who was suffering from a nasty C. diff infection. Approved treatments are not authorized for use in children, and Morales had to make a harrowing journey to secure off-label treatment for her child. “None of us said it, but we were all afraid Mundo was going to die,” she tearfully told Eric. Read further to understand how this policy change has had a real impact on patients.
Matchday results show the impact of immigration policy on budding doctors
Every year, tens of thousands of medical students nervously open envelopes to find out where they will spend the next few years of their training, during which time they receive specialized training. For international students, this year’s Match Day, which took place on Friday, added an additional stressor: changes in federal immigration policy, including travel bans and visa processing delays.
Among non-U.S. students who attended medical school overseas, the residence match rate fell to 56.4%, the lowest level in five years, according to a report from the National Residency Matching Program. This means that nearly half of applicants were unable to secure a residential position. The percentage of international students requiring visa sponsorship was even lower at 54.4%, but 67.9% of applicants with green cards who had attended medical school overseas were eligible for visa sponsorship. By comparison, the match rate for fourth-year medical students at U.S. schools was 93.5%.
Study finds diabetes outcomes worsen when patients lose insurance
With the passage of last year’s One Big Beautiful Act, which included deep cuts to Medicaid, millions of people will lose their health insurance. This is likely to further worsen outcomes for people with diabetes, according to a new study led by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University. Researchers analyzed the electronic medical records of more than 39,000 patients, more than 5,000 of whom experienced insurance “drops,” defined as two or more consecutive visits to a community health center without insurance. Researchers found that compared to people with insurance, people with unstable coverage had higher HbA1C, a measure of blood sugar levels, and needed more insulin to manage their disease.
The authors of the study, published in JAMA Health Forum, found no evidence that insurance cancellation was associated with serious complications such as kidney failure or amputation, but cautioned that it will take time for more serious consequences to become apparent. “What we’re seeing are early warning signs. Once you lose insurance, this disease becomes even more difficult to manage,” study lead author Nathalie Huguet said in a press release.
what we are reading
- Trump administration approaches CDC selection as CDC continues to change leadership, Bloomberg
- She was in labor at a Florida hospital. She then appeared in Zoom court for refusing a C-section, ProPublica
- The Iran war has not disrupted the pharmaceutical supply chain. Things may change if the conflict drags on, STAT
- Opinion: The problem with promoting “gold standard science”, Andark
- HBO’s ‘The Pit’ reveals how hospital cyberattacks wreak havoc, endanger patients and disrupt critical care, The Conversation
What word? Test your knowledge with today’s STAT Mini crossword.
