Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is overhauling an advisory committee tasked with making vaccine safety recommendations to the Centers for Disease Control.
Kennedy announced Monday that all 17 members of the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices were being removed in order for the Trump administration to replace them.
“Today we are prioritizing the restoration of public trust above any specific pro- or anti-vaccine agenda,” Kennedy said in a statement.
“The public must know that unbiased science — evaluated through a transparent process and insulated from conflicts of interest — guides the recommendations of our health agencies.”
Prior to running HHS, Kennedy strongly criticized conflicts of interest within public health agencies and the close ties between scientific researchers and the pharmaceutical industry. Activism against corruption and against the status quo on vaccines are two planks of Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again agenda, which seeks to combat the rise of chronic disease and promote healthy lifestyles.
Kennedy’s shakeup of the ACIP is meant to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive order last month directing his administration to restore integrity and reproducibility to scientific research, HHS said in a news release. All 17 of the committee members were appointed by former President Biden and most of them were put on the panel last year. The Trump administration would have had to wait until 2028 to have a majority on the committee if it did not fire the sitting members.
“ACIP’s new members will prioritize public health and evidence-based medicine. The Committee will no longer function as a rubber stamp for industry profit-taking agendas,” Kennedy added.
“The entire world once looked to American health regulators for guidance, inspiration, scientific impartiality, and unimpeachable integrity. Public trust has eroded. Only through radical transparency and gold standard science, will we earn it back.”
Senator Bill Cassidy (R., La.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, said Monday that he spoke with Kennedy about the new membership and voiced concerns about the possible appointment of anti-vaccine activists.
“Of course, now the fear is that the ACIP will be filled up with people who know nothing about vaccines except suspicion. I’ve just spoken with Secretary Kennedy, and I’ll continue to talk with him to ensure this is not the case,” Cassidy said on X.
His statement came in response to a Wall Street Journal op-ed from Kennedy laying out his reasons for disbanding the ACIP in its current form.
Cassidy is a medical doctor who specialized in liver disease and previously worked on child vaccination programs. During the confirmation process, Cassidy pressed Kennedy on vaccines and wavered on whether to confirm Kennedy because of his extensive history of making false statements about vaccine efficacy. RFK Jr. disputes that he is anti-vaccine. Cassidy ended up supporting Kennedy’s confirmation and laid out the concessions he obtained, including assurances that Kennedy would not interfere with ACIP.
“If confirmed, he will maintain the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices without changes. CDC will not remove statements on their website pointing out that vaccines do not cause autism,” Cassidy said at the time.
Before Kennedy wavered on that promise, Cassidy said that Kennedy had been living up to his commitments on vaccines. It remains to be seen whom Kennedy will select to run the committee.
The ACIP will meet later this month at CDC headquarters in Atlanta.