US Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, a vaccine sceptic, has removed all 17 members of a committee that issues official government recommendations on immunisations.
Announcing the move in an editorial in the Wall Street Journal, Kennedy said that conflicts of interest on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (Acip) were responsible for undermining trust in vaccinations.
Kennedy said he wanted to “ensure the American people receive the safest vaccines possible.”
Doctors and health experts have criticised Kennedy’s longstanding questioning of the safety and efficacy of a number of vaccines, although in his Senate confirmation hearing he said he is “not going to take them away.”
On Monday he said he was “retiring” all of the Acip panel members. Eight of the 17 panellists were appointed in January 2025, in the last days of President Biden’s term.
Most of the members are practising doctors and experts attached to major university medical centres.
After the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves vaccines based on whether the benefits of the shot outweigh the risks, Acip recommends which groups should be given the shots and when, which also determines insurance coverage of the shots.
Kennedy noted that if he did not remove the committee members, President Trump would not have been able to appoint a majority on the panel until 2028.
“The committee has been plagued with persistent conflicts of interest and has become little more than a rubber stamp for any vaccine,” Kennedy wrote.
He claimed that health authorities and drug companies were responsible for a “crisis of public trust” that some try to explain “by blaming misinformation or antiscience attitudes.”
In the editorial, Kennedy cited examples from the 1990s and 2000s and alleged that conflicts of interest persist.
“Most of ACIP’s members have received substantial funding from pharmaceutical companies, including those marketing vaccines,” he wrote in the Wall Street Journal.
Acip members are required to disclose conflicts of interest, which are posted online, and to recuse themselves from voting on decisions where they may have a conflict.
