Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired all 17 members of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory panel, claiming it “has been plagued with persistent conflicts of interest and has become little more than a rubber stamp for any vaccine.” But there’s no evidence of problematic conflicts of interest or that the group inadequately scrutinizes vaccines.
Vaccines are added to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s immunization schedule after consultation with an outside advisory group and when the benefits outweigh the risks. Contrary to claims from Tucker Carlson and others, the COVID-19 vaccines will not become mandatory in schools just by being added to the CDC schedule. States and local districts make those determinations.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been tracking outbreaks of acute flaccid myelitis — a serious condition mainly affecting children — since 2014. The CDC hasn’t seen a reason for concern this year, but Facebook posts have wrongly claimed that the agency has issued a “warning of polio-like outbreak” this fall. The claim seems to have originated from an outdated news article.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention document reviews the challenges of using a “shielding” approach to protect high-risk people living in places such as refugee camps from COVID-19. But conservative commentator Candace Owens misinterpreted it to mean the agency was proposing putting high-risk Americans into camps.
Federal vaccine monitoring systems have identified no safety concerns with the COVID-19 vaccines for pregnant people. Preliminary Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data show that miscarriage is not more frequent than expected in vaccinated people. Online posts, however, falsely contend that such data, as reported in a CDC publication, show an 82% miscarriage rate.
Former Vice President Joe Biden overstated the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s staffing cuts in China during the Trump administration. He said the CDC reduced its staff to four, but it was actually 14.
While his administration has faced criticism for being slow to ramp up testing for coronavirus infections, President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that the problem was with his predecessors, saying the administration “inherited a broken system” that it “rebuilt.” That’s misleading.
As the COVID-19 disease caused by the new coronavirus has spread around the world, a number of politicians, news organizations and public figures have made the false claim that the Trump administration cut the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s anti-pandemic work in over 40 countries to just 10.
Federal officials have provided confusing and sometimes contradictory statements about the number and availability of tests to diagnose new coronavirus infections. We’ll explain how testing works, what happened with the CDC’s coronavirus test and what’s known about how many tests are available in the U.S.
Democrats have criticized President Donald Trump for his administration’s response to the new coronavirus, making claims about cuts to public health programs and the silencing of government experts. But they haven’t always gotten their facts right.