One recent morning, I found myself reading a book to my toddler about two young bears who go to the doctor to get their booster shots. One of the bears is nervous and asks the bear doctor why he needs the shot when he isn’t even sick. The doctor explains the science behind vaccination and the young bear agrees to the booster. A crowd has gathered in the waiting room to witness his bravery; they applaud.
This is a children’s story about three bears who talk. That’s not the only way the story differs from our reality.
The future of vaccine policy is uncertain under Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the secretary of health and human services, given his history of criticizing vaccines and his desire to change the childhood vaccine schedule. This week, many doctors watched nervously as his handpicked Centers for Disease Control and Prevention vaccine advisory panel met to debate multiple vaccines.
The results were confusing and the process chaotic, but things largely turned out better than expected. The committee voted against recommending the combined measles, mumps, rubella and varicella vaccine for children under 4 (though kids can still get the M.M.R. and chickenpox vaccines separately). It also postponed a planned vote on the hepatitis B vaccine for newborns, despite plenty of debate among several members that revealed a deep skepticism about the vaccine. Members raised exaggerated fears about harm from the Covid-19 vaccine but still narrowly rejected a resolution that would have urged states to require prescriptions for the shots.
There’s a lot of uncertainty and confusion for public health in America, and it will mostly fall to individual doctors to help people understand which vaccines they need to get and when. The advisory panel, for instance, voted to rescind federal recommendations for Covid vaccines in favor of shared clinical decision-making, putting the onus on doctors to decide about the shots. I spoke with doctors from multiple states who are trying to understand how best to advise their patients now.
Some states, like Massachusetts and California, are entering new health alliances with neighboring states to generate the scientific recommendations that used to be a federal responsibility. But what does that mean for physicians in states like Florida, where anti-vaccine sentiment has resulted in a complete dismissal of science and recommendations are following political leanings rather than data?
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The post I Asked Doctors About Vaccine Chaos. Here’s What They Said. appeared first on New York Times.
