Federal vaccine advisors hand-selected by anti-vaccine Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have voted to eliminate a recommendation that all babies be vaccinated against hepatitis B on the day of birth. The decision was made with no evidence of harm from that dose and no evidence of any benefit from the delay.
Public health experts, medical experts, and even some members of the panel decried the vote, which studies and historical data indicate will lead to more infections in babies that, in turn, will lead to more cases of chronic liver disease, liver cancer, and premature death.
“I will just say we have heard ‘do no harm’ is a moral imperative. We are doing harm by changing this [recommendation],” Cody Meissner, a pediatrician and voting member of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), said as he voted against the change.
The 8–3 vote today was the third time the committee attempted to withdraw the long-standing universal recommendation, which has been in place since 1991. The recommendation was made after attempts to vaccinate only “high-risk” infants failed, leading to a 37 percent increase in infected infants between 1979 and 1989. After the universal recommendation for a birth dose was made, infections soon after birth nearly disappeared.
No supporting evidence
When the panel—ACIP, a committee within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—first tried to erase the recommendation in September, Joseph Hibbeln, a psychiatrist on the panel, raised the obvious concern that they hadn’t actually seen any data supporting the change. The committee was considering recommending delaying the vaccine until the first month of life. But as Hibbeln pointed out, they hadn’t actually reviewed any data comparing the risks and benefits of giving a dose at birth versus at one month.