Top RI Doctor Chan Discusses Impacts of Sec. Kennedy’s Vaccination Decisions
Top RI Doctor Chan Discusses Impacts of Sec. Kennedy’s Vaccination Decisions
The CDC’s vaccine advisers wield enormous influence. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) reviews data on vaccines, debates the evidence, and votes on who should get the shots and when. Accordingly, insurance companies and government programs like Medicaid are required to cover the vaccines recommended by the panel.
Now that process has been thrown into chaos.
“This is a big, big deal. So, ACIP was an independent scientific and medical committee that determined recommendations objectively about who should get vaccinated here in the United States of America, and it's been followed as guidance by lots of other countries,” said Dr. Chan.
“These were 17 experts, really the cream of the crop. In fact, we have one person here in Rhode Island, one of my colleagues Sybil Cineas, who was on it — a very good, trusted doctor, but the firing of these people is really going to hamstring us here in this country in terms of understanding what to do,” said Dr. Chan.
"I think vaccines are one of the biggest scientific and medical advancements of this century. A lot of these infectious diseases that we have vaccines for were killing or causing significant sickness and disease for people in the last hundred years,” said Dr. Chan. “Vaccines are really a marvel of American science.”
“That being said it is a decision that needs to be made by a person in conjunction with their primary care physician or other provider,” said Dr. Chan.
“What worries me the most is just the spread of misinformation by these conspiracy theorists. I'm okay if people decide to not get a vaccine but it really should be based on science and evidence,” adds Dr. Chan.
How to Move Forward
“What's going to probably happen moving forward is that some of the national organizations — the American Academy of Pediatrics, there's the Infectious Disease Society of America — some of these organizations that are populated by infectious diseases experts by vaccine experts are probably going to be the ones to come out with some more of these formal recommendations that many of us physicians will follow,” said Dr. Chan.
These efforts are already in motion, said Dr. Chan. Shortly after Dr. Chan's appearance on GoLocal LIVE, Secretary Kennedy announced eight new ACIP members including Dr. Robert Malone, a biochemist who made early innovations in the field of messenger RNA but in more recent years has been a vocal critic of mRNA technology in Covid-19 vaccines.
The firing by Kennedy contradicts a promise he made to U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy (LA-R), during his confirmation hearings, when as a nominee, Kennedy said he would not change the ACIP panel.
Cassidy, on Monday after the firings, criticized Kennedy.
“Of course, now the fear is that the ACIP will be filled up with people who know nothing about vaccines except suspicion,” Senator Cassidy wrote on X.
Cassidy is a physician, and he voted for Kennedy's confirmation.