What the new pediatric vaccine schedule means for children
The new pediatric vaccine schedule reduces vaccine recommendations for children. Here’s what you need to know:
The U.S. CDC’s Vaccine Advisory Committee will discuss and potentially vote on recommendations on issues such as COVID-19 vaccine injury and prolonged COVID-19 infection at meetings scheduled for March 18 and 19, according to a Federal Register notice.
The notice was posted on February 25th.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices’ recommendations have historically been used to guide U.S. health insurance coverage, state policies regarding vaccines required in schools, and how doctors advise parents and patients.
The commission was reconstituted last year after U.S. Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vaccine skeptic, fired all 17 members.
President Kennedy is calling for fundamental changes to the nation’s vaccination policy, including ending widespread recommendations for six childhood vaccinations and cutting funding for mRNA-based vaccine research.
The committee previously voted to repeal widespread recommendations for COVID-19 vaccines. When they last met in December, they voted to remove the recommendation to vaccinate all newborns in the United States with the hepatitis B vaccine.
Several medical groups are suing to challenge policies adopted under the Kennedy administration, saying they have lowered vaccination rates.
Earlier this month, major U.S. medical groups asked a federal judge to block the administration from implementing new guidelines that would reduce the number of vaccines routinely recommended for children and to bar President Kennedy’s handpicked Vaccine Advisory Committee from convening its next meeting.
