A vaccine advisory panel picked by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is going to take a look at the childhood vaccine schedule, including whether a commonly used adjuvant is safe, according to a newly released document.
A workgroup of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, will analyze the safety of aluminum and other ingredients included in multiple different vaccines, according to the document, which was dated Oct. 8.
“For example, do either of the two different aluminum adjuvants increase the risk of asthma?” the document states.
Aluminum salts are part of at least some vaccines against diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, pneumococcal disease, meningococcal disease, haemophilus influenzae type b bacterium, human papillomavirus virus, hepatitis A, polio, and hepatitis B. They have served as adjuvants, or substances used to boost the immune response in recipients, since the 1930s.
A 2022 paper from researchers with the CDC and other institutions found an association between receipt of vaccines with aluminum and asthma in young children. “CDC is not changing vaccine recommendations based on this single study, but further investigation is needed into this potential safety signal,” the agency states on its website. It also says that “following the recommended vaccine schedule provides children and teens with the best protection from potentially serious diseases.”
Kennedy said after the paper was published that the study “hints at one of the catastrophic side effects of childhood jabs—the asthma epidemic.”
More recently, Danish researchers said in a study that they found no links between aluminum exposure and 50 disorders, although updated supplementary material did indicate a higher risk of Asperger’s syndrome with increased exposure. Kennedy called for the journal that published the study, which he said was “badly flawed,” to retract it—a call that was rejected.
The ACIP workgroup will also analyze the timing and order of different vaccines, including whether certain vaccines should be administered on the same day or spaced out, and the efficacy and safety of vaccine schedules used in different countries, including Denmark, the document says.
The group plans to review information from published and unpublished research and safety surveillance systems. It may request data from entities inside and outside the government.
Ultimately, the group will “determine whether a change in the vaccine schedule may be warranted, outline various options, and vote on which option to recommend to the full ACIP for consideration,” according to the document.
A member of ACIP is the chair of the group, and members will include experts from a variety of disciplines, the document states. CDC did not return a request for comment regarding which member is leading the group by publication time.
ACIP workgroups meet in private. They present findings during public ACIP meetings.
ACIP provides advice to the CDC, which may or may not be accepted. The CDC typically accepts the advice.
Martin Kulldorff, the chair of ACIP, said in June during the first ACIP meeting after Kennedy remade the panel, that a new workgroup would look at “the cumulative effect” of childhood vaccines, such as “cumulative amounts of vaccine ingredients.”
Kulldorff previously said in a report solicited by the Institute of Medicine that “a wide variety of different vaccine schedule components can be studied,” including “interaction effects of different vaccines given on the same day, the ordering of different vaccines, and the effect of cumulative summary metrics such as the total number of vaccines or the total amount of some vaccine ingredient.”
Dr. Vinay Prasad, the Food and Drug Administration’s top official, who said recently that the U.S. vaccine schedule may not be optimal, wrote in a memorandum that receiving vaccines at the same time may increase compliance with vaccine recommendations but “the potential downside is that multiple vaccines administered together may interfere with efficacy—one or more vaccines may not be as effective—or there may be new or higher rates of safety signals that would not have occurred with sequential vaccination.”
He said the regulatory agency “will require pragmatic, randomized controlled trials, randomizing persons eligible for multiple vaccines to concomitantly administer them in a single session, or to administer some sequence of the vaccines.”
Dr. Jane Orient, executive director of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, said that a review of the vaccination schedule is welcome but that the ACIP inquiry “stops short of questioning the fundamental axiom that vaccines are the bedrock of public health.”
She told The Epoch Times via email that perhaps vaccines do more harm than good, referencing studies of vaccinated versus unvaccinated children, and that ACIP should closely examine the necessity of each vaccine on the schedule by looking at its risk and benefits, as well as the characteristics of the disease it is meant to prevent.
Another organization, the American Medical Association, states on its website that “vaccines are safe, effective and powerful weapons in the fight against infectious diseases.”
The new announcement came shortly after the CDC updated the childhood schedule to endorse standalone chickenpox vaccination, rather than as part of a combination vaccine, for children under the age of 4 based on advice from ACIP. The CDC also adjusted its recommendation for COVID-19 vaccines to recommend consultation with a health care professional before receiving one of the shots.
The CDC over the summer also stopped recommending influenza vaccines containing thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative, following a recommendation from ACIP. Members had said they were worried about cumulative exposure to mercury for children and adults who followed the CDC’s schedule and received influenza vaccines each year.
President Donald Trump said in a September briefing that parents should take their children to receive vaccines across multiple visits. He also said, “We have already taken out and are in the process of taking that mercury and aluminum.”