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Science Sidelined As Vaccine Policies Change, Risking National Health Crisis

Opinion

Business Honor - Vaccine Policy Shifts Risk Health Crisis

Business Honor
15 September, 2025

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s HHS leadership replaces science with ideology, risking resurgence of preventable deadly diseases.

The Senate hearing on Wednesday with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. brought to light a dismal and disturbing fact: scientific expertise is being booted from the helm of America's public health system. Confronted with the reality that COVID-19 vaccines saved almost 2 million lives, Kennedy dodged, invoking data chaos — a tried and true defense of eroding public confidence by sowing uncertainty and doubt.

Kennedy's history of pushing vaccine disinformation — like the discredited myth connecting childhood vaccines and autism — now forms the basis of federal policy. His unsubstantiated assertion that mRNA vaccines kill young people goes against the overwhelming scientific consensus. This is not a matter of rhetoric; it's changing the way that public health agencies operate.

Since being appointed, over 3,000 scientists and public health experts have departed the CDC, NIH, and FDA. Grants were cut, life-saving research suspended, and policies for vaccine distribution politicized. Kennedy's firing of the entire Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and the CDC director warn of a purge of scientific opinion in favor of ideology.

The trickle-down effect is evident in states such as Florida and Idaho, where officials repeat Kennedy's anti-mandate, even going so far as to threaten to eliminate mandates for childhood vaccination against lethal diseases such as measles and hepatitis B. These are not benign policy changes — they're open invitations to outbreaks.

The United States was once at the forefront of public health innovation and disease prevention. That foundation is being dismantled today under an onslaught of mistrust and disinformation. Public health is not a personal set of beliefs; it is a shared protection founded on evidence. Under the leadership of RFK Jr., that protection is being dismantled — and Americans will suffer the consequences in illness, resurgence, and needless death.