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A closely watched advisory panel to the CDC voted Thursday to tweak recommendations for a measles vaccine that includes protection against the varicella, or chickenpox, virus. The new guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) suggests the vaccine, called MMRV, shouldn’t be recommended for children under age 4 because of a small risk for febrile seizures in that age group. The seizures can be prompted by fevers associated with viruses or, sometimes, vaccines. They usually last for a few minutes and, while they are scary for parents to witness, are generally harmless, doctors say. (Bendix, Edwards, Lovelace Jr. and Szabo, 9/18)

The confusion-riddled voting process marked the end of a frequently heated meeting, in which a theme of distrust seemed to pervade the proceedings. (Kansteiner, 9/18)

A key government advisory committee discussed on Thursday whether to recommend delaying the first hepatitis B vaccine shot, currently given at birth, by at least one month for babies who are born to mothers that test negative for the virus. Experts fear such a change could set back decades of public health work that has almost eliminated infant hepatitis B cases in the U.S. The members of the Advisory Committee on Immunizations Practices pushed a vote on the issue to Friday. Experts fear that if ACIP does shift the initial shot, more children will develop chronic liver infections and complications. (Oza, Chen and Cirruzzo, 9/18)

A panel of federal vaccine advisers appointed by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will launch a new review on the use of vaccines during pregnancy, the panel’s chair said. Martin Kulldorff, a statistician and former Harvard professor who chairs the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), made the announcement at the start of Thursday’s meeting, where panelists will consider recommendations related to the pediatric vaccine schedule, including hepatitis B. (Weixel, 9/18)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Kennedy’s Take On Vaccine Science Fractures Cohesive National Public Health Strategies

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has had a busy few months. He fired the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, purged the agency’s vaccine advisory committee, and included among the group’s new members appointees who espouse anti-vaccine views. The leadership upheavals, which he says will restore trust in federal health agencies, have shaken the confidence many states have in the CDC and led to the fracturing of a national, cohesive immunization policy that’s endured for three decades. (Armour, Mai-Duc, Maxmen and Allen, 9/19)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: �鶹Ů�� Health News’ ‘What The Health?’: Ousted CDC Officials Clap Back At RFK Jr.

The recently fired head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told senators that health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ordered her to fire top officials and agree to approve changes to national vaccine recommendations — before the recommendations were made and regardless of what the science says. Meanwhile, Congress heads toward a government shutdown, with expanded subsidies for Affordable Care Act plans in the balance. (Rovner, 9/18)

The MAHA movement is rallying behind its leader, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., after senators berated the health secretary in back-to-back hearings this month for firing the CDC’s director and moving to revise vaccine guidance. Now those in Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again Movement plan events in nearly a dozen cities, from Florida to California, on Sept. 27 to thank him for sticking up for kids’ health, they said during a call with supporters. (Paun, 9/18)

Discredited autism researcher David Geier has full access to personally identifiable data from the original Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) and may be angling to conduct more studies with newer VSD data, according to a former CDC official. In a letter sent to co-chairs ahead of the Senate's health committee hearing on Wednesday, Daniel Jernigan, MD, MPH, former director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, provided insights into what Geier is doing inside the agency. (Fiore, 9/18)

A modeling study today in JAMA Network Open estimates that COVID-19 vaccination of all people in the United States in 2024-25 would have prevented 10% to 20% of hospitalizations and deaths compared with no vaccination, with additional indirect benefits to older adults compared with vaccinating only high-risk groups. The findings come at a crucial time, after the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in May recommended COVID vaccines only for adults 65 and older and for people at risk for severe illness. (Van Beusekom, 9/18)