NEW YORK (AP) – Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s new vaccine advisory board meets this week and votes are expected to change its shot recommendations for Covid-19, hepatitis B and Chicken Pox.
The exact questions voted on Thursday and Friday in Atlanta are unknown. Department of Health and Human Services officials did not immediately answer questions seeking new details. agendaalthough the department announced five additional appointments to the committee on Monday.
Some public health experts are worried that the vote will at least raise unfair new questions about vaccines in the minds of parents.
Perhaps even more consequential is a vote in which government programs will limit vaccine payments for low-income families.
“I’m fastening my seat belt,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a vaccine expert at Vanderbilt University.
The panel, the Advisory Committee on Vaccination Practices, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention About how to use an already approved vaccine. CDC directors have mostly accepted these recommendations. These recommendations provide extensive listening to your doctor and guide you through your vaccination program.
Kennedy was a leading anti-vaccine activist before becoming the country’s top health official; Dismissal The entire panel of 17 members was first met at the beginning of this year. I’ve replaced it Groups containing several anti-vaccine voices.
Let’s take a look at the three vaccines being discussed.
COVID-19 (COVID-19)
Before Kennedy becomes a health secretary, ACIP will usually vote in June to reaffirm the shot’s recommendations for respiratory viruses that have made millions of Americans sick in the fall and winter.
Last June, Kennedy’s ACIP voted I recommend a flu shot For Americans, they were silent on the Covid-19 shots.
Before that meeting, Kennedy announcement He had removed Covid-19 shots from the CDC recommendations for healthy children and pregnant women. The move has been heavily criticized by groups of doctors and public health organizations. Litigation By American Pediatrics and Other Group Academy.
A few days after Kennedy’s announcement, A CDC official said Families can consult with their doctors and get the 2024-2025 version of Covid-19 shot for their children. That clarification meant it would be recorded by the federal government’s vaccine for Children program, which pays shots for families who lack money or proper health insurance coverage. I currently handle about half of my childhood vaccinations in the United States each year.
However, like influenza shots, there is a new Covid-19 prescription every time to explain the changes in the strains circulating. The committee has not yet voted on whether it would recommend COVID-19 shots this season, or whether those shots should be covered by the VFC program.
Make the photo even more complicated: when the FDA last month license In this fall Covid-19 shot, the agency took the unusual step of using it for healthy young adults. Children.
If ACIP simply follows that and there is no additional clear language from the CDC, it “deprives about half of the access of American children,” said Dr. Sean O’Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Pediatrics are urging that vaccinations for all children between the ages of six months and two will continue.
Hepatitis B
Hepatitis B can cause serious liver infections. In adults, the virus spreads through sharing of needles in gender or during use.
However, the virus can also be handed over to an infected mother’s baby, and 90% of infected infants also develop chronic infections.
The hepatitis B vaccine was first approved in the United States in 1981. In 2005, ACIP recommended doses within 24 hours for all medically stable infants weighing at least 4.4 pounds (2 kilograms).
Vaccination of infants is emphasized for women with hepatitis B and not being tested for it. Infant shots are 85% to 95% effective in preventing chronic hepatitis B infection, studies show.
Vaccinations for neonatal hepatitis are considered a success, and recent peer-reviewed studies do not show safety issues with giving children a shot on the first day of their lives, Schaffner said.
However, Kennedy’s ACIP members wanted to revisit the guidance in June.
Schaffner noted that health officials had relied on maternal screening before birth, but many cases had been overlooked.
“There have been a lot of mistakes,” he said. “And there was a continuous send from the mother to the child.”
MMRV
Chicken Pox was once a common childhood nuisance, causing itchy skin rashes and fever.
However, highly contagious viruses can also lead to complications such as skin infections, brain swelling and pneumonia. Severe cases are more common among teens and adults who get it for the first time. A virus called Varicella can reactivate later in life and cause painful illnesses called shingles.
The government first recommended that all children take the Chicken Pox vaccine in 1995, leading to a dramatic reduction in cases and deaths.
In 2005, MMRV shot combinations (measles, mumps, rubella, water cell) were licensed. The CDC initially recommended that doctors and parents use combo shots with separate MMR and water cell injections.
However, within a few years, the study found that children who acquired combo shots developed post-vaccination attacks more frequently compared to children who acquired rash, fever, and, in rare cases, separate shots.
2009, ACIP Recommendations changedremoved the preferred language and said that combination shots or individual shots would be acceptable at the first dose.
Today, most pediatricians suggest separate doses for the first shot, but give them a shot tailored to the second dose, says pediatric experts.
Again, according to AAP’s O’Leary, there is no new evidence of the harm from the MMRV shots.
Why revisit it now?
“This version of ACIP is an organized effort to create distrust of vaccines,” O’Leary said.
HHS announces new committee members
Meanwhile, HHS officials announced five new committee members on Monday. The list has been raised to 12.
The new members are:
– Pharmacist and podcaster Hilary Blackburn, who has said HHS officials are the director of medication access and affordability for AscensionRx.
– Dr. Eveling Riffin, an obstetrician and gynecologist based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
– Dr. Kirk Millhoan, a pediatric cardiologist who runs a medical missionary organization that is sought after for the heart and soul with his wife. He appeared in the 2024 Congress Hearing He said the increase in cardiovascular disease among older teenagers and younger adults should be attributed to vaccines.
– Dr. Raymond Pollack, a transplant specialist based in Skokie, Illinois.
– Katherine Stein, a disease researcher at Western Reserve University. During the Covid-19 pandemic, She worked together It is an Ohio anti-vaccine group, with cases counts being inaccurate and claims that the coronavirus is not as dangerous as health officials have drawn it.
___
The Associated Press School of Health Sciences is supported by the Howard Hughes Medical Institution’s Department of Science and Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. AP is solely responsible for all content.
