For Americans concerned about the nation’s public health system, it’s been a heartbreaking year, but just this week has been especially brutal. On Monday, the Department of Health and Human Services announced that Martin Kulldorff, a well-known opponent of vaccines, has been appointed to serve as the chief science officer for the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at HHS.
Two days later, the Food and Drug Administration announced that Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg would oversee the FDA’s drug division, on the heels of her recent anti-vaccine work.
The same day, the public learned that Kirk Milhoan, a doctor who’d peddled bizarre claims about Covid vaccines, would lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices as it considered sweeping changes to the childhood vaccine schedule.
On Friday morning, things continued their slide from bad to worse. MS NOW reported:
Without data to support their decision and defying warnings from doctors, medical associations and public health groups, a federal advisory panel stocked with loyalists to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has voted to stop recommending a life-saving vaccine to infants at birth.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will stop recommending the hepatitis B birth dose for infants — specifically those born to mothers who test negative for the virus — until they’re at least 2 months old, following a vote on Friday morning by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). Eight panel members voted to stop the recommendation, with three dissenting.
Commenting on the developments, Michael Osterholm, a public health expert at the University of Minnesota, told The New York Times, “Today is a defining moment for our country. We can no longer trust federal health authorities when it comes to vaccines.”
Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a former physician who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which has oversight of the Department of Health and Human Services, has raised related concerns. The day before the vote, the senator said online, “The ACIP is totally discredited. They are not protecting children.”
A day later, Cassidy published a follow-up online statement:
Those looking for the sentence in Cassidy’s statement that reads, “And therefore, I’ve decided to…” were left wanting.
This has been a year-long problem. The senator keeps expressing disapproval of the administration’s health policies, but he also keeps refusing to go any further.
Two weeks ago, CNN’s Jake Tapper noted that the Louisiana Republican cast the deciding vote to allow an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to become the nation’s health secretary. When the host asked if Cassidy gave RFK Jr. too much credit, the senator replied, “The fact is the scientific community agrees that vaccines are safe. That’s all I can say.”
The latter half of the quote, however, wasn’t quite right. Cassidy, in a position of real power and influence on Capitol Hill, has plenty of other options. He could concede publicly that confirming Kennedy was a tragic mistake; he could call for Kennedy’s resignation; he could even schedule hearings and haul officials from HHS, CDC and the FDA to Capitol Hill to demand answers and changes.
Cassidy isn’t doing any of these things. He’s instead publishing a couple of tweets, criticizing radical and dangerous public health moves in the mildest of ways.
I can’t ready the senator’s mind. Maybe he’s worried about the GOP primary challenge he’s facing in Louisiana next year? Maybe he’s letting partisan considerations hold him back? Maybe he’s under pressure from Republican leaders not to do anything more consequential?
Whatever his motivation, Cassidy can’t escape responsibility for the damage Kennedy and his cohorts are doing to the nation’s public health, and while he could take meaningful actions in response, the senator is choosing not to, seemingly indifferent to the consequences of his inaction.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
