Trump demands that “proof” vaccines work amid the CDC turmoil
President Donald Trump has questioned the COVID-19 vaccine, and has proven by pharmaceutical companies that demand that they work amid the changes at the CDC.
Straight Arrow News
SAN FRANCISCO – As an infectious disease expert, Dr. Daniel Griffin hears frequent concerns about whether patients will be able to get the new Covid vaccine. Even his relatives are worried.
Griffin, who works clinically in Long Island, New York, said his sister-in-law is in her 40s and is extremely wary of the enduring, debilitating health issues that tormented millions of Americans who signed up for the coronavirus.
“She said, ‘If I don’t get vaccinated now, will I have access to the fall?” Many people have made decisions for fear that they will lose access to the vaccine.”
Many public health experts say the fear and confusion are the result of the Covid vaccine policy established under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in part, believe it is due to design.
Griffin explained less approvals for shots and more administrative restrictions on access to them on August 27th of the Food and Drug Administration, which operates under the HHS.
Community vaccinations, once readily available at major drug stores and other outlets, often require medical consultations with people under the age of 65 who do not have the underlying conditions for increased risk of severe illness, even without appointments.
Medical groups for women, children oppose instruction
Despite protests from healthcare institutions such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the University of American Obstetricians, vaccines to protect healthy children and pregnant women are no longer recommended.
Children between the ages of 6 and 23 months old are “highest risk of severe Covid-199” and should be vaccinated, according to the AAP. The ACOG noted that symbiotic infections during pregnancy are associated with “severe disease, adverse consequences of pregnancy, and an increased risk of maternal death.”
The new guidelines occur when Covid cases, emergency room visits and hospitalizations are rising nationwide, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but not at an astonishing speed, and nowhere near the height of the pandemic in the first two years.
“Covid-19 activity is increasing in many parts of the country,” the CDC also said on its website on August 29th, under the HHS umbrella.
The FDA decision was panned by former CDC leaders, including Dr. Richard Besser, who served as acting director in 2009, and stated in a statement:
This week, governors of California, Washington and Oregon announce the formation of an alliance to devise vaccine recommendations for the states, whilst avoiding the CDC, accusing them of becoming a “political tool.”
Statement erodes vaccine trust
Kennedy, who has long voiced concerns about the vaccine’s efficacy and safety, calls Covidshots, which have been administered to more than two-thirds of the global population “the deadliest vaccine they have ever made.”
Health professionals undermine confidence in vaccinations where such kinds of statements from those currently in charge of public health in the country have proven safe and effective. Kennedy also cut nearly $500 million in funding for the development of a vaccine that relies on mRNA, the main technology used in Covid shots, and says it’s ineffective.
Dr. Jesse Goodman, former chief science officer at the FDA and now the chief physician of infectious diseases at Georgetown University, said Americans are “confusing with all these different messages.”
“I’m worried that some people may not be vaccinated due to access or cost issues, or that some people may not be vaccinated because of suspicion,” he said.
San Francisco family therapist Holly Mikeletus said he was unhappy with the lack of information from the Trump administration regarding the Covid vaccine.
Over the past few years, Mikeletus said the government will spread the word when new vaccine formulations become available and will see signs appearing in drug stores.
“You know it’s time to get a new booster or something else,” she said. “Now, I’m not watching communication. Only over 65? I literally feel like I’m disappointed in getting it, and I want it.”
“The spirit is really not letting people get a vaccine.”
Kennedy and his allies argue that the public can still receive COVID vaccinations if necessary, but they revolve around convenience, insurance coverage and cost issues. Health insurers have covered the cost of shots recommended by the CDC, but it is not clear for now what they will pay for is more restrictive eligibility.
“The (FDA) decision will not affect access to these vaccines,” HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon said in an email.
These consultations could present obstacles to people who don’t have time, or perhaps even regular providers, that means prescribing a vaccine.
And that is exactly the purpose of a new limitation, critics of Kennedy’s leadership at HHS have focused on his long history of positions against established science.
“The spirit is really not giving people a vaccine,” Griffin said.
Vaccination: Low availability and affordable
Dr. Paul Offit, a Philadelphia-based vaccine expert and pediatrician, said Kennedy is generally very hostile to vaccines. Other than that, he makes it difficult to get them.
“He’s doing everything he can to make that vaccine less, more affordable, less likely to be insured and perhaps feared,” Offit said of the community shot.
On the day the FDA was announced, Kennedy posted a statement on social media.
“1. End the Covid vaccine order. 2. Make the vaccine available to particularly vulnerable people. 3. Request a placebo-controlled trial from companies. 4. End the emergency.”
The federal health emergency and vaccine order, as stated by his own department website, was suspended on the same day, May 11, 2023, more than 15 years before Kennedy took office. It is highly controversial whether vaccines are readily available.
“Everyone should be able to make a reasonable choice to get this vaccine,” Offit said.
More than 250,000 hospitalizations, 30,000 deaths
CDC estimates that between 9.8 million and 16.1 million Americans signed Covid contracts from October 1, 2024 to June 7, 2025. The result was a visit of 2.7 million to 3.8 million people, 270,000 to 440,000 hospitalizations and 32,000 to 51,000 deaths.
Even though healthy young people rarely suffer serious consequences from coronavirus infections, many doctors argue that the widespread and easy availability of vaccines is still valuable.
The CDC calls the condition a “significant public health threat,” citing a national survey that estimates 9.5 million people in 2023, including 300,000 children, have long communities.
Goodman said vaccine policies should not be based primarily on the possibility of people dying from contracting the disease.
“There are tens of thousands of hospitalizations a year,” he said. They emphasize the health care system. People who can’t afford it, people who miss work.”
Dr. Peter Ching-Hong, an infectious disease expert at the University of California, San Francisco, said that most of the questions he has in his field about vaccines come from pregnant women and that parents are confused about how to teach their children.
But even the elderly who know they are eligible are wondering if they have to pay for the shot, so they are less likely to get it, Jin Hong said.
“We have to encourage people to get the vaccine,” he said.
“Vaccination skeptics” among new members of the advisory panel
California is one of 34 states where pharmacists can vaccinate people before they are recommended by the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).
However, ACIP has not met until September 18th to make that decision much later than usual, so residents in most other states will have to wait for committee approval or present a prescription to get vaccinated.
It is assumed that the panel will give a thumbs up. Kennedy fired all 17 ACIP members in June and brought in eight new new members a few days later.
Chin-Hong called the new panelists “not just vaccine skeptics, but they’re not knowledgeable about general vaccines and general health.”
It could increase vaccine resistance among people who hesitate.
More than 90% of US adults who have won Covidshots in the past year have received them at pharmacies, and Offit believes new vaccines will be available again at these sites this fall, but there are even more restrictions.
It’s a long way from when government officials made every effort to convince people to provide a protective vaccine well past Pandemic Days.
“It’s a very uncertain time,” Offit said. We are just in this upside down world. ”
