This tracker will be continuously updated to reflect any major actions taken by the Trump administration to disrupt vaccine research, production, or uptake within the public.
January 20: In a flurry of first–day actions, Trump orders the U.S. to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO). Besides operating “as a de facto drug and vaccine regulatory agency” for lower income countries, the WHO also “also runs the process through which the strains that annual flu shots and Covid vaccines should target are selected.”
January 21: The Trump administration announces an “immediate pause” on federal health agency activity such as “regulations, guidance, announcements, press releases, social media posts and website posts.”
January 22: The National Institutes of Health (NIH) cancels its National Vaccine Advisory Committee meeting in compliance with the Trump administration’s federal health agency activity embargo.
February 13: Senate confirms RFK Jr.’s nomination as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS). During his confirmation hearing, the longtime anti-vaccine advocate refused to dismiss his belief that vaccines cause autism.
February 14: Trump administration targets over 5,000 recently-hired federal health agency workers for layoffs “including dozens at the Vaccine Research Center housed at NIH.”
February 20: RFK Jr. indefinitely postpones the first Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) meeting under Trump. ACIP “advises the director of the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention [CDC] on how to use vaccines in the U.S. population to prevent the spread of infections, such as measles, influenza, whooping cough, and polio, and how to prevent serious complications from infections such as hearing loss, cancer, or death.”
February 20: RFK Jr. orders the CDC to halt multiple vaccine promotion initiatives, including its “Wild to Mild” flu vaccine ad campaign.
February 26: The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) abruptly cancels its Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) meeting to determine seasonal flu shot formulations for 2025 and 2026.
February 26: Trump administration considers defunding H5N1 bird flu vaccine research with HHS review of a Biden-era contract with Moderna.
March 6: In a Fox News Interview with Sean Hannity, RFK Jr. publicly opposes vaccinating poultry against H5N1 bird flu for the first time. The HHS Secretary warned of potentially “turning those birds into mutant factories […] that could actually accelerate the jump to humans,” if vaccines are unable to confer sterilizing immunity.
March 7: STAT News reports on how the activity embargo at NIH is disrupting the vaccine patent pipeline:
- “Clampdowns on external communications and new contracts at the National Institutes of Health by President Trump’s administration […] have also blocked the agency from sharing research materials with collaborators and taking crucial steps to ensure the discoveries its own scientists are making can later be used in the development of drugs and vaccines. For five weeks, employees at NIH technology transfer offices have been barred from filing new patent applications and been restricted from licensing existing ones, according to emails obtained by STAT and interviews with current and former NIH employees.”
March 12: NIH cancels over 40 research grants related to vaccine hesitancy:
- “An email circulated among NIH leadership this week included a list of grants that were to be terminated and details on the specific language to use in those notices. ‘It is the policy of NIH not to prioritize research activities that focuses gaining scientific knowledge on why individuals are hesitant to be vaccinated and/or explore ways to improve vaccine interest and commitment,’ the email states.”
March 13: Three weeks after canceling the original VRBPAC meeting, the FDA meets behind closed doors to announce influenza targets for 2025-2026 flu vaccines:
- “The meeting was not previously announced or open to the public and took place the same day as the previously scheduled VRBPAC meeting would have taken […] The hour-and-a-half-long meeting was attended by officials from FDA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Department of Defense, and was called to a close 55 minutes before it was scheduled to end, according to a summary released by FDA.”
March 16: NIH orders agency scientists to remove references to mRNA vaccine technology from their research grant applications.
March 25: The Washington Post reports that HHS has hired David Geier to conduct a federal study on possible links between vaccines and autism. Geier is a vaccine skeptical researcher who has no medical degree and was punished by Maryland’s Board of Physicians for practicing medicine without a license.
March 28: The CDC cancels the release of a measles outbreak assessment that emphasized the importance of vaccination against the disease.
March 28: The Wall Street Journal reports that Peter Marks, the FDA’s top vaccine regulator, has been forced out of government:
- “He submitted his resignation after a Health and Human Services official earlier in the day gave him the choice to resign or be fired, people familiar with the matter said. ‘It has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the Secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies,’ Marks wrote in a resignation letter referring to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”
April 2: The Wall Street Journal reports on the FDA’s abrupt decision to delay full approval of Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine:
- “Federal drug regulators have missed the deadline for making a key decision regarding a Covid-19 vaccine from Novavax, days after the Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine chief was pushed out. The agency was set to give full approval to Novavax’s shot, but senior leaders at the agency are now sitting on the decision and have said the Novavax application needed more data and was unlikely to be approved soon, people familiar with the matter said.”
April 9: RFK Jr. falsely asserts that “single antigen vaccines have never worked,” in a CBS interview:
April 25: The Wall Street Journal reports on further delays to the full approval of Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine due to FDA’s request for a new clinical trial.
May 6: FDA Commissioner Marty Makary taps Vinay Prashad to direct the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. Prashad—who in 2024 claimed that “[We’d] probably be better off as a result of not having the FDA,”—is now the agency’s top vaccine regulator. According to The New Republic:
- “Prasad has advocated for more trials and testing of new medical treatments before approval, reversing approval for the pediatric Covid vaccination, and a let-it-rip mentality when it comes to kids getting repeatedly infected. As early as 2021, he advocated that kids knowingly get each other sick and that Covid testing be banned. In 2023, he wrote a post titled, ‘Do not report COVID cases to schools & do not test yourself if you feel ill: Only non-violent resistance can halt irrational public health actors.’ He has repeatedly said masks were ineffective, contrary to mountains of evidence.”
May 14: RFK Jr. cautions the public from taking his medical advice in a House hearing:
- When asked hypothetically if he would vaccinate his children today for measles during a House hearing Wednesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said ‘probably,’ but added he doesn’t think people should be taking medical advice from him. ‘My opinions about vaccines are irrelevant,’ he said in response to the question from Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan of Wisconsin during the House Appropriations Committee hearing. ‘I don’t want to seem like I’m being evasive, but I don’t think people should be taking medical advice from me.’ […] ‘But that’s kind of your jurisdiction, because CDC does give advice, right?” Pocan asked. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is under HHS. ‘I think what we’re going to try to do is to lay out the pros and cons, the risks and benefits, accurately as we understand them, with replicable studies,’ Kennedy replied.”
May 15: The Wall Street Journal reports on HHS’ plan to no longer recommend routine Covid-19 vaccinations for those 6 months and older.
May 17: FDA approves Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine after weeks of delay. However, the license limits use to “people 65 and older and people aged 12 to 64 who have at least one medical condition that puts them at higher risk of severe illness if they contract Covid”
May 20: FDA announces new Covid-19 immunization framework that limits vaccine access to only high risk and elderly populations. New vaccines for those under the age of 65, including infants, will not be approved unless drug makers conduct additional clinical trials.
May 22: The Presidential Commission to Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) invokes vaccine-skeptical rhetoric in it’s first major report on childhood chronic disease:
- “Tucked deep into the report is a section on the childhood vaccine schedule, and how parents have concerns about ‘their possible role in the growing childhood chronic disease crisis.’ The line is a dog whistle to Kennedy’s vaccine-skeptical followers, and calls back to an idea he’s been pushing for decades through the nonprofit he founded, Children’s Health Defense. The group routinely points to an increase in the number of recommended childhood vaccine doses in the late 1980s as the impetus for rising rates of illness in American kids. The commission’s report makes a similar case, and calls for studies on whether vaccines cause injury or disease. Kennedy’s plans for reforming vaccine regulation in the U.S. get support, too: The report says vaccines should be tested against placebo, in larger and longer trials, and also calls for mandatory reporting of adverse events after vaccination, and a removal of liability protections for vaccine makers.”
May 27: RFK Jr. rescinds recommendation Covid-19 vaccine recommendations for healthy pregnant people and healthy children. STAT News reports that:
- “Kennedy cited no new evidence to support the decision to rescind the recommendations, nor did he indicate why he circumvented the normal procedure for vaccine recommendations. Absent from the video was anyone from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which sets policy for who should get approved vaccines based on the advice of its expert panel, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. The CDC is currently without an acting director. Several sources have told STAT neither the CDC nor the ACIP was consulted on or alerted to the announcement before the video announcement was posted to Kennedy’s X account.”
May 28: FDA cancels $766 million contract with Moderna (awarded during the Biden administration) to develop vaccines for potentially dangerous flu subtypes, such as H5N1.
June 1: FDA Commissioner Marty Makary defends RFK Jr.’s unilateral decision to alter Covid-19 recommendations on CBS’ “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan:”
June 8: STAT News reports that four members of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) have had their special government employee status’ revoked.
June 9: RFK Jr. abruptly fires all 17 sitting members of ACIP, as well as the 8 confirmed appointees set to replace members whose terms were expiring. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, the HHS secretary claimed that “the committee has been plagued with persistent conflicts of interest,” and described his “clean sweep” as necessary to “re-establish public confidence in vaccine science.”
June 11: RFK Jr. announces the 8 ACIP members he’s chosen to replace the 25 current and future members he fired just days earlier. According to STAT News:
- “The new Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices includes several well-known critics of vaccines, including figures who’ve raised concerns about Covid-19 shots and other immunizations and who are affiliated with organizations that have questioned vaccine safety, such as the National Vaccine Information Center. The new panel also includes members who appear to have little or no vaccine expertise.”
Image Credit: “Vaccines Save Lives” by Johnny Silvercloud is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
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