US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr appointed a new vaccine advisory group after dismissing the previous panel. Photo / Getty Images
US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr appointed a new vaccine advisory group after dismissing the previous panel. Photo / Getty Images
US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr has appointed a new vaccine advisory group to replace the one he dismissed earlier in the week, including on the new panel a biochemist who warned against Covid jabs.
Kennedy, US President Donald Trump’s point man on health, who is an admitted vaccinesceptic, sacked all 17 experts of the advisory panel to the main US health agency on Monday (UST), accusing them of having conflicts of interest with pharmaceutical companies.
The unprecedented move has been slammed by the Democratic Opposition, not to mention health experts who warned of an attack on medical expertise. Kennedy announced today that he had appointed eight new members to the Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices (ACIP).
Kennedy's move was criticised by Democrats and health experts as an attack on medical expertise. Photo / Getty Images
“The slate includes highly credentialled scientists, leading public health experts, and some of America’s most accomplished physicians,” he said, posting brief biographies of the committee members.
“All of these individuals are committed to evidence-based medicine, gold-standard science and common sense,” he said, insisting they are “committed to demanding definitive safety and efficacy data before making any new vaccine recommendations”.
Among the experts listed are a pediatric infectious disease specialist who previously served as an advisor to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, and a biostatistician who publicly opposed lockdown measures promoted by public authorities during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Also included is biochemist Robert Malone, popular among anti-vaccine advocates, whose research in the 1980s contributed to the development of messenger RNA vaccines.
The new panel includes scientists and public health experts, including vaccine skeptic Robert Malone. Photo / Getty Images
But Malone made a name for himself during the Covid pandemic by relaying alarmist and unsubstantiated claims about the shots.
The new ACIP comes as Kennedy steps up his efforts to reshape the country’s vaccination policies.
In recent years, Kennedy has spread numerous conspiracy theories about Covid vaccines and alleged links between vaccinations and autism, notably through the Children’s Health Defense organisation he co-founded.
He has suggested Covid is a virus that was “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.
