CDC vaccine panel to review hepatitis B, other childhood vaccines, at December meeting

A key advisory panel that oversees nationwide vaccine recommendations may vote to restrict access to hepatitis B immunizations for newborns and reconsider recommendations for a wide variety of other childhood vaccines when it is scheduled to meet this week at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. The committee, known as the Advisory […]

According to a draft agenda posted to the CDC’s website, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices plans to vote on new recommendations around hepatitis B, an incurable viral infection that attacks the liver. Maya Homan/Georgia Recorder

A key advisory panel that oversees nationwide vaccine recommendations may vote to restrict access to hepatitis B immunizations for newborns and reconsider recommendations for a wide variety of other childhood vaccines when it is scheduled to meet this week at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

The committee, known as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, is charged with setting national guidelines around which people should be vaccinated against a plethora of preventable diseases and when those vaccines should be administered. The recommendations play a key role in determining which vaccines insurance companies are willing to cover and how accessible those immunizations are to the public.

CDC panel abandons, for now, more controversial vaccine proposals but casts doubt on safety

According to a draft agenda posted to the CDC’s website, the committee plans to discuss the current childhood and adolescent immunization schedule, which includes vaccines against diseases like polio, diphtheria, tetanus, and RSV. They will also vote on new recommendations around hepatitis B, an incurable viral infection that attacks the liver.

The current three-dose series for hepatitis B includes one vaccine administered to infants within 24 hours of birth, and subsequent booster shots given one month and six months after the initial dose. ACIP has been recommending a hepatitis B vaccine for all infants since 1991, which resulted in a 99% drop in serious infections between 1990 and 2019.

A resolution seeking to alter current CDC recommendations around hepatitis B vaccines for newborn children was initially scheduled for September’s meeting, but was later postponed.

If ACIP members choose to implement the changes, official CDC guidelines may recommend that pediatricians delay administering the first dose of the hepatitis B vaccine until at least 30 days after birth for all children whose mothers test negative for the disease.

Chari Cohen, who serves as president of the Hepatitis B Foundation, said she was deeply concerned about the push to alter the childhood vaccine schedule, arguing that efforts to delay doctors from administering the hepatitis B vaccine to newborns are rooted in misinformation.

“There’s no scientific argument that one could really make to get rid of the vaccine,” she said. “There’s been no new data published, no scientific, rigorous data that would change anyone’s mind.”

And while private health insurance plans may elect to continue covering the hepatitis B vaccine, Cohen says she worries about vaccine access for children enrolled in Medicaid or the Vaccines for Children program, which provides free immunizations to children who are uninsured or underinsured.

Ahead of the panel’s vote, states like Massachusetts and Rhode Island have preemptively announced that they will continue to provide access to the hepatitis B vaccines for newborns, regardless of what the CDC panel decides. 

However, Georgia’s state government has taken a different approach. The state’s Department of Public Health said it “will monitor updates and federal guidance on administering the hepatitis B vaccine and assess how these changes may affect the health of Georgia’s newborns,” according to a statement from Nancy Nydam Shirek, the department’s communications director.

Shakeups at the HHS

The panel’s December meeting is its first since Trump promoted a scientifically unsupported link between Tylenol and autism, more than 600 CDC workers were fired from the CDC, a prominent vaccine skeptic was appointed to the second-highest office at the CDC and U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. instructed the CDC to update its website to display unproven claims linking vaccines to autism.

A CDC page on vaccine safety now states that “studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism,” though a small disclaimer at the bottom of the page notes that the header stating “vaccines do not cause autism” has not been removed due to an agreement with U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican who heads the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. 

Cassidy, a doctor, cast the deciding vote to confirm Kennedy as health secretary on the condition that Kennedy “maintain the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices without changes.” Kennedy later backtracked on that promise, firing all 17 previous members of the committee and replacing them with a slate of hand-picked appointees, many of whom are seen as vaccine skeptics.

Since the panel’s most recent meeting in September, former ACIP Chair Martin Kulldorff — a doctor and former Harvard Medical School professor who is known for his opposition to vaccine mandates — has been appointed to another position within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, where he will serve as a key advisor to Kennedy. 

Dr. Kirk Milhoan, a Hawaii-based pediatric cardiologist and senior fellow at the Independent Medical Alliance, will serve as the committee’s new chair, according to a press release from the HHS. The Independent Medical Alliance — formerly known as the Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance — advocated for the use of the drug ivermectin and other unproven methods to treat COVID-19. Robert Malone, a doctor and biochemist who said he views the label of anti-vaxxer as “high praise,” will serve as vice chair of the committee.