The Trump administration’s new vaccine advisers have been slammed by some health experts and accused of encouraging vaccine mistrust, after endorsing only certain shots for this season’s flu jabs – those that are free of an ingredient falsely tied to autism by anti-vaccine groups.
After Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had fired the 17-member Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices (ACIP) and replaced them with several vaccine sceptics, last week the new seven-member panel deliberated the safety of a preservative used in less than 5% of US flu jabs, based on a presentation from an anti-vaccine group’s former leader – and without allowing the usual public airing of scientific data from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The Associated Press reports in PBS that the preservative, thimerosal, has long been used in certain vaccines that come in multi-dose vials, to prevent contamination as each dose is withdrawn. But it has been controversial because it contains a small amount of a particular form of mercury.
Although numerous studies have found no evidence that it causes autism or other harm, since 2001, all vaccines used for American children younger than six years old have come in thimerosal-free formulas, including single-dose flu shots that account for most influenza vaccinations.
The advisory panel first voted – with one abstention – to back the usual recommendation that nearly everyone age six months and older get an annual flu vaccination. Then the advisers decided people should only be given thimerosal-free single-dose formulations, voting 5-1 with one abstention.
That would include single-dose shots that already are the most common type of flu vaccination as well as the nasal spray FluMist. It would rule out the subset of flu vaccine that is dispensed in multi-dose vials.
“There is still no demonstrable evidence of harm,” said one panellist, Dr Joseph Hibbeln, a psychiatrist formerly with the National Institutes of Health.
“But whether the actual molecule is a risk or not, we have to respect the fear of mercury that might dissuade some people from getting vaccinated.”
While the debate involved only a small fraction of flu vaccines, some public health experts say the discussion unnecessarily raised doubt about vaccine safety, at a time when fewer than half of Americans get their yearly flu shots, and mistrust in vaccines overall is growing.
They decried the panel’s lack of transparency in blocking the presentation of CDC’s analysis of thimerosal that concluded there was no link between the preservative and neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism.
The data had been posted on the ACIP’s website two days before the meeting, but were later removed – because, according to ACIP member Dr Robert Malone, the report hadn’t been authorised by Kennedy’s office. Committee members said they had read it.
Kennedy has long contended a tie between thimerosal and autism, and has also accused the government of hiding the danger.
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