US vaccine panel eyes childhood immunisations
Kennedy, who has a long history of sowing doubt about vaccine safety, this month fired all 17 members of a Centres for Disease Control and Prevention vaccine advisory panel and replaced them with his own picks.
At least two CDC staff members left over the changes. Major medical experts and former members of the panel, known as the Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices, have expressed concern over its reconstitution.
The influential American Academy of Pediatrics, boycotted the panel's first meeting in protest, saying it would publish its own evidence-based childhood vaccine schedule.
More than half of the remaining seven members have advocated against vaccines.
The outcome of the meeting is critical, as the panel's recommendations influence the official US immunisation schedule, determine insurance coverage for vaccines and guide procurement for the CDC's Vaccines for Children program.
Committee chair Dr. Martin Kulldorff - a biostatistician and epidemiologist who publicly criticised COVID-19 lockdowns and was fired from Harvard for refusing to take a COVID-19 vaccine - said the panel will review the total number of vaccines US children and adolescents receive, which he said exceeds those given to children in other developed nations.
The group will also evaluate individual vaccines as well as the cumulative effect of the recommended vaccine schedule.
Kulldorff also said the panel would study the use of a combined measles-mumps-rubella-varicella shot as well as research on the optimal timing of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine "to resolve religious objections" that some parents have regarding the shot used in the US
A presentation on Thursday will be led by Lyn Redwood, former leader of the Children's Health Defence, an anti-vaccine group founded by Kennedy.
Redwood's slide presentation on thimerosal's effects on the brain, released on Tuesday, included a reference to a study that does not exist, the listed author told Reuters. The presentation has since been updated to remove the reference.
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