CDC and Kennedy: Nine former heads of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have issued a rare joint rebuke of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., alleging that his vaccine rollbacks, research cuts and sweeping personnel moves are “endangering every American’s health.”
The op-ed, published in the New York Times, follows a tumultuous stretch at the CDC that included the firing of Director Susan Monarez and a wave of senior resignations. The former directors say the policy shifts leave the country at risk of lowering childhood vaccination rates, weakening outbreak defences, and inviting new epidemics.
The warning lands amid Kennedy’s broad overhaul of federal vaccine policy. Since May, HHS has rescinded routine COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for healthy children and pregnant women and reshaped immunisation panels, moves that have drawn sharp pushback from medical groups and lawmakers.
Reuters reports the CDC’s revamped vaccine committee will meet Sept. 18 after Monarez’s ouster and a near-complete reset of membership.
Kennedy has defended his approach in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, arguing the CDC “strayed from its core mission” and that public trust collapsed due to “bureaucratic inertia, politicised science and mission creep.” The White House has also publicly backed him amid the CDC upheaval.
Tensions inside HHS remain high. More than 1,000 current and former employees have now signed a letter urging Kennedy to step down, citing fears that his actions undermine science and imperil public health, a follow-on to earlier internal letters after a deadly shooting at CDC headquarters. Separately, outside experts and media reports have criticised HHS for halting or cutting hundreds of millions of dollars tied to mRNA vaccine work, ABC News reported.
