Senator Bill Cassidy, a powerful Republican senator from Louisiana, has called for an important federal vaccine meeting this week to be delayed, after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired and replaced the panel’s prior members.
In a post to the social media site X Monday evening, Cassidy said the meeting should be pushed back until individuals with “more direct relevant expertise” on immunology and epidemiology are added onto the reconstituted panel, known as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP.
“Although the appointees to ACIP have scientific credentials, many do not have significant experience studying microbiology, epidemiology or immunology. In particular, some lack experience studying new technologies such as mRNA vaccines, and may even have a preconceived bias against them,” Cassidy wrote on X.
Despite Cassidy’s call, the ACIP meeting will be held as planned on Wednesday and Thursday, according to a source familiar with its scheduling.
Kennedy named only eight people to replace the 17 panelists he fired. Among them are Robert Malone, who has made false statements about messenger RNA vaccines, and Retsef Levi, who has called for a halt to vaccinations with mRNA shots.
Cassidy’s comments are the strongest he’s made in response to actions taken by Kennedy, who made a series of vaccine-related pledges to secure the senator’s vote during his confirmation.
Many medical associations have also criticized Kennedy’s recasting of ACIP, and called for the panel’s previous members to be reinstated.
“Removing a panel of independent experts appointed through a transparent, public nomination process and selected for their expertise on this issue will undoubtedly seek to sow further doubt and cause growing confusion among healthcare professionals and their patients,” one letter said.
Testifying in a Congressional hearing Tuesday, Kennedy claimed the previous panel was "rife and pervasive with pharmaceutical conflict.” Members’ conflicts of interest are publicly disclosed and typically reflect physicians’ role running clinical trials of vaccines. Conflicts for Kennedy’s hand-picked panel have not been posted on the CDC website.
ACIP provides guidelines for physicians and patients on how approved vaccines should be used. They review epidemiological data, results from clinical trials and weigh the benefits vaccination offers against the risks. Their recommendations typically provide the basis for insurance coverage.
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which oversees ACIP, typically signs off on new guidelines from the panel. But there’s no permanent director currently confirmed, and some confusion about who, if anyone, is serving as acting head. As HHS secretary, Kennedy can endorse ACIP recommendations in the CDC director’s place.
This week’s meeting will feature discussion and votes on various vaccines, including shots for respiratory syncytial virus, influenza and COVID-19. The agenda, which has been changed since the committee’s overhaul, also includes a discussion on a mercury-based preservative called thimerosal, which has been the target of fringe theories attempting to link vaccination with autism.
Thimerosal is no longer used in most vaccines and testing has not found an association between it and autism.
