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Health Care

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The Big Story

RFK Jr. ends COVID vax guidance for kids, pregnant women

Health and Human Services Secretary (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Tuesday that his agency would no longer be recommending routine COVID-19 vaccines for children and pregnant women, bypassing the traditional vaccine recommendation process.

In a video posted to X, Kennedy said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had removed the vaccines from its immunization schedule.

The current recommendation from the CDC is for everyone at least 6 months old, including pregnant women, to get COVID vaccines annually.

“Last year, the Biden administration urged healthy children to get yet another COVID shot, despite the lack of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children,” Kennedy said in the video, flanked by Food and Drug Administration Commissioner (FDA) Marty Makary and National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Jay Bhattacharya.

The NIH typically is not involved in vaccine regulation, and the 58-second video did not offer any details about the evidence that led to the decision. HHS did not respond to questions.

Bypassed traditional process: Normally, the FDA decides whether to approve or authorize a vaccine. Then the CDC’s independent vaccine advisory panel meets in an open public meeting to decide questions like who should get it, when, and how often. The panel isn’t scheduled to meet on the COVID vaccine until June 25-27.

The CDC director will typically endorse the recommendations, so they can be implemented nationwide. The agency is currently without an acting director, and it appears Kennedy made the decision unilaterally.

Remember: The change in CDC recommendation comes a week after Makary and the agency’s top vaccine regulator announced a plan to limit the approval of new COVID-19 vaccines to adults over 65, as well as people who are high risk.

In the framework, the officials even listed pregnancy as a condition for high risk of COVID complications that would qualify a person for a booster.

Kennedy has a long history of opposition to a variety of vaccines and petitioned the FDA in 2021 to revoke the emergency-use authorizations of the COVID-19 vaccines. Makary and Bhattacharya are also prominent skeptics of the COVID-19 shot and vaccine mandates.

After President Trump won the 2024 presidential election but before Kennedy was confirmed as HHS secretary, he said in an interview that he wouldn’t “take away anybody’s vaccines” and rejected the label of being anti-vaccine.

Welcome to The Hill’s Health Care newsletter, we’re Nathaniel Weixel, Joseph Choi and Alejandra O’Connell-Domenech — every week we follow the latest moves on how Washington impacts your health.

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Essential Reads

How policy will be impacting the health care sector this week and beyond:

US, Argentina launching new ‘alternative’ to WHO

The top health authorities of the U.S. and Argentina are launching what they call an “alternative international health system” separate from the World Health Organization (WHO). On the first day of his second term, President Trump signed an executive starting the yearlong process of withdrawing the U.S. from the WHO. In February, Argentinian President Javier Milei followed suit. In a joint statement Tuesday, Health …

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THC ban bill in Texas about ‘protecting kids’ after 6-year flaw, officials say

(NewsNation) — A bill that would ban all products containing THC is now on Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk after the Senate late Sunday approved the House version of the bill advanced by the lower chamber last week. NewsNation’s Xavier Walton says lawmakers feel the bill will protect children. “We can’t regulate it,” Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said. “We don’t have enough police to check every …

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Can Type 2 diabetes be reversed?

Of the estimated 38 million Americans diagnosed with diabetes, an overwhelming majority has Type 2. Diabetes is a chronic health condition that affects how the body turns food into energy. It develops when blood sugar levels are too high, causing the pancreas to produce insufficient insulin, which is a hormone that regulates blood sugar levels. Lifestyle and genetic factors can lead to Type 2 diabetes, which can be prevented …

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In Other News

Branch out with a different read from The Hill:

Former surgeon general says negative impacts from loneliness comparable to smoking, obesity

Former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, in a Sunday interview, warned about the adverse effects of chronic loneliness, which could lead to a shorter lifespan. Murthy, on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” told host Kristen Welker that struggling with loneliness and isolation increases the risks of depression, anxiety and suicide, along with the risk of heart disease, stroke and dementia in older adults. “The …

Full Story

Around the Nation

Local and state headlines on health care:

New Hampshire state, hospitals settle lawsuit over Medicaid tax (NHPR)
State Health Officials warn of potential exposure to Hepatitis A after infection in food service worker in Provincetown (WHDH)
Nebraska DHHS confirms measles case in Panhandle — state’s first since 2017 (Nebraska Examiner)

What We’re Reading

Health news we’ve flagged from other outlets:

A Harvard scientist built a database of 2,100 NIH grant terminations. Then his own funding was cut (KFF Health News)
RFK Jr. threatens to bar government scientists from publishing in leading medical journals (Politico)
Novo’s sales woes herald Danish export slowdown, watchdog says (Bloomberg)

What Others are Reading

Most read stories on The Hill right now:

The Memo: Trump paints himself into a corner on Putin and Ukraine

President Trump has boxed himself into a corner with Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine — and it’s not entirely clear how he gets out. Trump’s … Read more

GOP fears Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ is ‘debt bomb’

The fiscal impact of President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” which one prominent budget hawk called a “debt bomb,” is becoming a significant … Read more