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The Trump administration’s assault on vaccine science has taken a predictable turn. Bombshell reporting from the Washington Post just revealed that Jay Bhattacharya, the acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has secretly blocked publication of a report that concludes COVID-19 vaccines are a significant boost to public health.
Two CDC scientists, speaking to WaPo anonymously out of fear for retaliation, said the report found that COVID vaccines drastically minimize risk of hospitalization after catching the virus. According to the study, healthy adults who received a jab reduced their risk of urgent care visits by 50 percent, and their risk of a hospital stay by 55 percent, compared to those who went unvaccinated.
The report had been slated to run on March 19 in the CDC’s research journal, the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Bhattacharya, however, delayed the piece, arguing that there were concerns with the study’s methodology.
“Dr. Bhattacharya wants to make sure that the paper uses the most appropriate methodology for such a study,” Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services told the paper.
As WaPo notes, a similar report using the exact same methodology to study the common flu vaccine ran in MMWR a week earlier.
The episode is incredibly fishy, following the playbook of HHS secretary and infamous vaccine skeptic RFK Jr, who previously called the COVID shot the “deadliest vaccine ever made.” In 2025, the Food and Drug Administration, a sub-agency of the HHS, moved to greatly limit access to the vaccine.
“The secretary has already taken steps to try and remove the availability of the vaccine from children and others,” former CDC safety director Daniel Jernigan told WaPo. “So if you’re putting out an MMWR that the vaccine is effective at preventing hospitalizations and medical care visits… that message is not line with the direction you’ve been taking with the removal of the vaccine.”
It’s only the latest in a laundry list of antivaxx moves by the HHS since Donald Trump appointed RFK to his current role.
Late in 2025, it was revealed that RFK’s HHS was planning a monstrous vaccine study which would have intentionally withheld hepatitis B vaccines from 7,000 newborn children in the West African nation of Guinea-Bissau. The purpose for the trial, medical experts argued, was for Donald Trump’s political appointees to make a “spurious association” between a well established vaccine and vaguely defined neurological problems.
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