Elon Musk this week amplified an unfounded claim, based on a distortion of vaccine safety monitoring data, that COVID-19 vaccines killed tens of thousands of people in Germany. The vaccines saved millions of lives worldwide during a deadly pandemic, and serious side effects or deaths from vaccination are rare.
During her confirmation hearing to become surgeon general, Dr. Casey Means had various back-and-forths with senators, who pressed her on topics related to vaccines, her qualifications and disclosure of her conflicts of interest. We looked into the sometimes-dueling claims from Means and the senators.
In sweeping changes to the childhood vaccine schedule, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention no longer recommends universal vaccination against six diseases. In justifying the move, health officials made misleading claims about vaccine safety while downplaying or omitting benefits.
Echoing a longstanding anti-vaccine trope, President Donald Trump falsely claimed that the American vaccine schedule “long required” babies to get “far more” vaccines than are given in “any other” country, and he directed health officials to better “align” practices with those of other countries. The recommended schedule in the U.S. is quite similar to that of other high-income nations, and it isn’t a federal mandate.
Our annual recap of the worst falsehoods of the year.
Upending decades-old guidance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee voted to no longer issue a blanket recommendation that all newborns receive a hepatitis B vaccine at birth. Throughout the meeting, many panelists made misleading claims about the vaccine.
The head of the Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine division claimed in a leaked email that “at least 10 children” died from COVID-19 vaccination, using that to justify major vaccine regulatory changes. Experts, however, say too little information was provided to verify the claim.
The vaccine advisory committee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is scheduled to meet Dec. 4 and 5. On the agenda: the hepatitis B vaccine, the overall childhood vaccine schedule and specific vaccine ingredients. We’ll summarize what we’ve written about these topics and what the committee has said about them in recent meetings.
Under Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime anti-vaccine advocate who is now Health and Human Services secretary, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revised its website to say that its previous statement that “vaccines do not cause autism” is “not an evidence-based claim.” But it’s the revised website that misleads about vaccines.
Amid confusion over this year’s updated COVID-19 vaccines, we explain what’s different this year and who experts say should get vaccinated.