"The last straw"—RFK Jr.'s anti-vaccine ally angrily quits CDC panel after spat
Quick Insights
The Bottom Line
RFK Jr.'s anti-vaccine appointee Robert Malone quit the CDC's vaccine advisory committee after a dispute over its status.
How This Affects You
Vaccine policy changes at the CDC could affect which vaccines are recommended for children and adults, potentially altering vaccination rates and disease prevention strategies.
AI Summary
Robert Malone, an anti-vaccine activist and former researcher whom Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appointed as vice chair of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, resigned Tuesday after a dispute over the panel's status. Malone quit following what he described as a "miscommunication" about whether the committee would be disbanded and reconstituted, after initially claiming on social media that the Department of Health and Human Services planned to dissolve ACIP without appealing a federal judge's temporary block on Kennedy's appointments. A federal judge last week halted Kennedy's wholesale replacement of all 17 original ACIP members and froze changes Malone's panel had made to vaccine guidance and the childhood vaccine schedule, ruling the moves likely illegal. Kennedy had fired the entire original committee last June and stocked it with anti-vaccine allies like Malone. The resignation marks another fracture in Kennedy's overhaul of federal vaccine policy as legal challenges mount.
What's Being Done
A federal judge has blocked RFK Jr.'s wholesale replacement of CDC committee members and frozen changes to vaccine guidance; Malone has resigned from the reconstituted panel.
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Many current and former employees say the actions of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are undermining the agency’s role in safeguarding public health.
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