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The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Nurse on new CDC vaccine panel said to have been ‘anti-vax longer than RFK'
One of the new members of a critical federal vaccine advisory board has argued for decades that vaccines caused her son's autism – a connection that years of large-scale studies and reviews refute. Registered nurse Vicky Pebsworth is one of eight new members to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (Acip), all hand-picked by the vaccine skeptic and Donald Trump's health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. 'She's probably been anti-vax longer than RFK has,' said Dr David Gorski, a Wayne State University School of Medicine professor, who is considered an expert on the anti-vaccine movement. Kennedy fired all 17 of the committee's previous members in June and stacked it with ideological allies. Pebsworth and Kennedy would have probably been known to each other, because their respective non-profits supported one another's efforts. 'If I had a child who I believed had been harmed by whatever – it doesn't have to be vaccines – I wouldn't then trust myself to be on a federal safety commission on that issue,' said Seth Mnookin, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor in science journalism who met and profiled Pebsworth in the mid-2000s. Pebsworth was also part of a 2020 lawsuit against Covid-19 vaccine mandates that aligns with Kennedy's agenda. In a declaration to federal court, Pebsworth argued that 'increases in the number of vaccines in the CDC schedule may be causally related to increases in the rates of chronic illness', an assertion that appears to be based on a debunked study, but has long been a talking point of anti-vaccine activists. 'They're the oldest prominent organization,' said Mnookin, whose book is called The Panic Virus: A True Story of Medicine, Science, and Fear. The information center represents 'the start of the modern-day anti-vaccine movement in the US', said Mnookin. Pebsworth joined Acip from the National Vaccine Information Center, where she has served as volunteer research director since 2006, according to a résumé filed in the same case. The Guardian sent a list of questions and an interview request to Pebsworth, but did not receive a response. The National Vaccine Information Center started in Virginia as Dissatisfied Parents Together in 1982, before changing its name in 1995. The group went on to receive major funding support from Dr Joseph Mercola, once described as 'the most influential spreader of coronavirus misinformation online'. Like other new members of Acip, Pebsworth comes to the role with medical credentials; she has a doctorate degree in nursing, taught college research courses and served as a consumer representative on federal panels. For decades, she has publicly argued that her son, Sam, was injured by the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine in 1998 – despite evidence showing there is no connection between vaccines and autism. Pebsworth organized conferences about alternative treatments for autism as early as 2001, including one in Michigan where then-doctor Andrew Wakefield spoke and where she told a reporter she had placed her son on a restrictive diet and administered chelation therapy – a treatment for heavy metal poisoning. Neither has been found to effectively treat autism. 'Back then in the early 2000s or the late 1990s, there were two main flavors of the anti-vax,' said Gorski. In Britain, Wakefield's paper in the Lancet proposed a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. His paper would be retracted in 2010 amid evidence of fraud and conflicts of interest. 'But then there was the American flavor with mercury and thimerosal, which had been used in several childhood vaccines as a preservative,' said Gorski. 'Back in the day we used to call them the 'mercury militias', but others used to call it the 'mercury moms'.' Thimerosal is a vaccine preservative that has been used since before the second world war. Its safety is considered settled science and yet it has been the subject of misinformation for decades. A galvanizing moment for the anti-vaccine movement came in 2015, when one of the worst measles outbreaks in years tore through Disneyland in California. The outbreak prompted lawmakers to tighten vaccine requirements for schools, drawing parents into the fray and providing a platform for anti-vaccine groups. 'I used to call anti-vax the pseudoscience that spanned the political spectrum – you could find leftwing anti-vaxxers, rightwing anti-vaxxers,' said Gorski. 'But now it's really, really built into the right,' he said. 'You can't deny that any more. It's become part of rightwing ideology.' In 2017, Pebsworth testified before a Virginia house subcommittee against a school mandate for a meningitis vaccine. In 2020, as Americans anxiously waited for a Covid-19 vaccine, she warned Americans could face unknown consequences from the vaccines. Pebsworth later testified in 2021 before the University of Hawaii's board of regents, arguing against Covid-19 vaccines. In most public testimony, Pebsworth identifies herself not only as the volunteer research director for the National Vaccine Information Center, but also as 'the mother of a child injured by his 15-month well-baby shots in 1998'. 'Groups like hers and probably even more prominently the Informed Consent Action Network have seen that most vaccine policy is at the state level,' said an expert in state vaccine law who declined to go on the record for fear of retaliation from the Department of Health and Human Services. 'They have a list of model legislation they encourage supporters to try to get introduced,' the expert said. At the same time, the groups have failed to accomplish their 'big swings': getting schools to drop vaccine mandates. The expert continued: 'My sense is that legislators know they're hearing from a very vocal minority. Landslide majorities still support requirements. It's lower than it was before the pandemic, but the public still understands the needs for these laws.' By 2017, Trump was weighing whether this vocal group could become part of his coalition. Before his first inauguration in early January 2017, Trump publicly said he was considering Kennedy to head a new committee on vaccines and autism. Only days before she was appointed to ACIP, Pebsworth and the founder of the National Vaccine Information Center argued against Covid-19 vaccines, stating in part: 'FDA should not be recommending mRNA Covid-19 shots for anyone until adequate scientific evidence demonstrates safety and effectiveness for both the healthy and those who are elderly or chronically ill.' More than 270 million Americans have received Covid-19 vaccines, and the federal government has closely monitored for rare events. That old trope of thimerosal played a leading role in the first meeting of Kennedy's reconstituted Acip panel. Committee members heard a presentation against thimerosal from Lyn Redwood, the former president of the World Mercury Project, which would become Kennedy's anti-vaccine group Children's Health Defense. A report on thimerosal's safety by career CDC scientists was pulled from the meeting by Kennedy's office. Ultimately, members recommended against seasonal influenza vaccines that contain thimerosal in a decision that shocked medical and scientific communities. Pebsworth abstained, arguing she wanted to vote separately on whether to recommend influenza vaccines. Pebsworth later said she wanted to vote separately on whether to recommend seasonal flu vaccines. She did not respond to questions from the Guardian about how she would have voted on flu shots, if she had the chance.
The Independent
3 hours ago
- The Independent
Starmer thanks NHS worker who looked after his brother
The Prime Minister has thanked an NHS worker who looked after his brother in the last weeks of his life. Sir Keir Starmer's brother Nick died on Boxing Day in 2024 aged 60, having been ill with cancer. In a video posted on social media to mark the 77th anniversary of the health service, the PM said that advanced nurse practitioner Ben Huntley made sure that his brother 'felt cared for and respected'. In the clip, Sir Keir is shown speaking to Mr Huntley in Downing Street, while other members of the public also meet with NHS staff who helped them. The Prime Minister said: 'My mum worked in the NHS and then she was very, very ill, for most of her life. And the NHS became our absolute lifeline. 'My sister worked for the NHS, my wife works for the NHS, and it was the NHS that looked after my brother who we lost last Boxing Day to cancer. 'Ben, you looked after him. I think from the moment he was in all the way through, and you made sure that he felt cared for and respected.' The PM later added: 'That meant a huge amount to me and my family and, on all of our behalves, I say through you a very special thank you to the NHS.' Earlier this week, Sir Keir told the BBC's Political Thinking that he 'made it my business to be there in the hospital' when his brother was told about his diagnosis 'so that I could begin to help look after him'. 'It's really hard to lose your brother to cancer, he was a very vulnerable man,' the Prime Minister said. He shared details of 'going up in the porter's lift into the back of the intensive care unit' and wanting to protect his brother's privacy. He told the same interview that US President Donald Trump asked about his brother in a call a 'few days' after he died.
BBC News
3 hours ago
- BBC News
Pharmacy inside Royal Derby Hospital set to relocate
The pharmacy inside Derby's biggest hospital is being moved away from its main 08:00 BST on Monday, the Pride Pharmacy at Royal Derby Hospital will operate from the former Amigos coffee shop on level two of the Kings Treatment dispensary and chemist has been based near the hospital's main entrance since February 2020, University Hospitals of Derby and Burton (UHDB) said, and dispenses about 10,000 prescriptions a trust said the new location would offer a larger waiting area and additional seating, and that the "purpose-designed" layout would be more efficient. The trust said the nearest car parks to the new Pride Pharmacy were car parks 2 and 3, which were for Blue Badge holders only, and there were 30-minute drop-off bays outside the nearest doors at entrance trust said average waiting times for Pride Pharmacy before the move were 23 added volunteers operated a yellow buggy service inside the hospital, from Monday to Friday, for patients with mobility issues.
