Kennedy's Panel Adds Dose of Confusion on COVID Shots

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s new vaccine advisers on Friday muddied the picture on this fall's COVID-19 vaccinations. The CDC panel declined to recommend the vaccines for anyone, leaving the decision on whether to have the shot up to Americans, the AP reports. At the same time, in a step toward restrictions, it recommended that everyone consult a clinician before being vaccinated. That creates a complication for people who have been able to get a free shot without justifying their decision to anyone, per the Washington Post. Those moves were just part of the panel's chaotic session, which included sudden reversals, postponements, and other twists. "We are rookies," panel Chair Martin Kulldorff said, per NPR.

• Delayed: Meeting in Atlanta, the panel voted to postpone indefinitely a vote on a vaccine for hepatitis B that is typically given to all newborns. Members said they weren't ready to decide on restricting the vaccine's use, with some saying they have unanswered safety questions. Others sounded pleased they didn't have to make a quick decision that could harm children, per the New York Times. Independent pediatric and infectious disease specialists had criticized potential restrictions, saying the vaccine has sharply reduced infant infections, per the AP.
• Inexperience: The hepatitis B discussion could be reflection of Kennedy's quick assembly of the panel. About half of the committee was named to their posts this week, and the inexperience seemed to add to the meeting's confusion. Members challenged CDC data and raised questions about studies in mice or other concerns that the agency's own safety surveillance hadn't deemed credible.
• Backtracking: Members reversed a decision they had made the day before to let a federal program cover the cost of a combined dose that protects against measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella, or chickenpox—apparently because some of them had misunderstood the measure's wording, per the Times.

• COVID vaccines: The panel deadlocked, 6-6, on requiring a prescription for a COVID shot; the tie meant the chair cast the deciding vote to defeat the measure, per CBS News. The panel decided not to vote on whether to recommend the shot for pregnant women, deferring the decision to CDC officials, per NBC News. And the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices dropped its previous recommendation that everyone 6 months and older have an annual COVID shot, suggesting "shared clinical decision-making" instead. The practical effects of telling people to consult a doctor first aren't clear, per the Post. Dr. Sean O'Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics called the decision not to recommend vaccination "extraordinarily vague" and said it would have "real-time impacts on American children," per the AP.
• Warnings: The panel also urged the CDC to adopt stronger language around the reputed risks of vaccination, an idea that received pushback from outside medical groups that said the shots have a proven safety record. O'Leary said the discussion involved clear efforts to "sow distrust" about vaccines. "It was a very, very strange meeting," O'Leary said.