American Medical Association calls for a senate investigation into CDC ACIP committee firings ahead of the vaccine meeting.
The public comments period opened and CDC ACIP committee members were all abruptly fired.
It's important to make contact with the senators that represent you to let them know that you want vaccines, and you back the AMA's call for reversing the CDC ACIP committee firings and investigating RFKJr for firing them. And to submit a public comment to CDC ACIP.
(see my letter and comments below)
AMA Calls for Senate Investigation of RFK Jr. — "We do not want to be on the wrong side of history," one delegate said - by Shannon Firth, Washington Correspondent, MedPage Today June 10, 2025 Physicians called on HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to immediately reverse his decision to fire all 17 sitting members of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), and called for a Senate investigation into his actions. Less than 24 hours after Kennedy announced that HHS had removed all of CDC's vaccine advisors, American Medical Association (AMA) delegates passed an emergency resolution urging Kennedy to reverse this move during their annual meeting. Delegates also directed AMA leadership to send a letter to the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee requesting an investigation into the firings.
The AMA isn't known for being… well for doing much of anything worthwhile in recent times at least, so if they're stepping up at all like this, and sending a letter to a Senate committee, you know this is serious, and really they should probably be rallying doctors into phone banking calls to the senate by now.
If any other HHS secretary had done this… actually probably no other HHS secretary would do something like this.
Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee: Lisa Murkowski (R - ALASKA) Tommy Tuberville (R - ALABAMA) John Hickenlooper (D - COLORADO) Chris Murphy (D - CONNECTICUT) Lisa Blunt Rochester (D - DELAWARE) Ashley Moody (R - FLORIDA) Bill Cassidy (R - ILLINOIS) Jim Banks (R - INDIANA) Roger Marshall, M.D. (R - KANSAS) Rand Paul, M.D. (R - KENTUCKY) Ed Markey (D - MASSACHUSETTS) Angela Alsobrooks (D - MARYLAND) Susan Collins (R - MAINE) Josh Hawley (R - MISSOURI) Maggie Hassan (D - NEW HAMPSHIRE) Andy Kim (D - NEW JERSEY) Jon Husted (R - OHIO) Markwayne Mullin (R - OKLAHOMA) Tim Scott (R - SOUTH CAROLINA) Tim Kaine (D - VIRGINIA) Bernie Sanders (I-VERMONT) Patty Murray (D - WASHINGTON) Tammy Baldwin (D - WISCONSIN)
If you're in a state with a senator on this committee, especially if your senator is a Republican, but no matter which side they're on – it's important that you write to that senator and make sure you let them know that you know that they're on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and that you know about the AMA's letter to that committee.
My letter to reps:
The firing of the entire CDC ACIP committee on vaccines by an anti-vax activist appointed in charge of the HHS is seriously inappropriate and suspicious. This requires investigation. Even the American Medical Association has called for an investigation and for these dismissals to be reversed immediately. I am concerned about continued access to life saving vaccinations for myself, and my community. I want vaccines. Someone needs to act now on this because most Americans want to be vaccinated and don't believe in anti-vax propaganda spread by people selling bogus "alternative" medicines. We need to know who's benefitting by ousting vaccine committee members.
Please feel free to copy or repurpose for your own letters to reps.
And when you're done with that, submit a comment to the CDC ACIP committee. You can find deets on that from Doctor Kaitlin Sundling:
Here are my CDC ACIP public comments from the past, and I don't mind if people copy from them to make your own comments:
APRIL 2025
I really want a Lyme Disease vaccine. I spend time outdoors and constantly exposed to ticks, and thanks to the PA Tick Lab service I've found that some of these ticks have been infected. I've had family and friends who've suffered with Lyme. Please let's get a Lyme vaccine, it's past due. I want the RSV vaccines available to people 50 to 59. Many people in their 50s are not just at high risk because of health issues, but also because of being in contact with grandchildren. According to the University of Michigan's National Poll on Healthy Aging 10% of grandparents 50 to 64 provide daily or nearly daily childcare. 18% of grandparents see their grandchild or grandchildren every day or nearly every day. And 6% of grandparents who are 50+ live with their grandchildren. People live in community with toddlers, you can't leave out people in our 50s. I want updated covid vaccines to match circulating strains. Eligibility should be for everyone and available prior to the start of the school year to prevent children becoming vectors with schools needing to close because of staff shortages which happens every winter. The covid vaccines need to be available to anyone twice a year so that disabled and elderly people don't need to dither, or wonder, or jump through hoops to figure it out. I want flu vaccines available with schedules that are uninterrupted and provided timely. I very often hear people talk about getting "crud" or "a bug" going around, especially people who've been traveling. If fresh vaccine uptake was higher for covid & flu, people would be sick less. People don't actually like being sick, and nobody's happy with the staff shortages that cause problems throughout society. I know that most people want vaccines. I hope that our government, for and by the people, will take note and act accordingly to bring up vaccine coverage across the board for all vaccines.
(Reference)
OCTOBER 2024
Hi, I’m Chloe Humbert and I have no conflicts to report. So where is the covid vaccine campaign? Where are the ads? Where are the billboards? Why are doctors not required to recommend the vaccines? If a doctor knew somebody had high blood pressure, and they failed to recommend medication, that wouldn’t be okay, yet doctors are remiss in recommending even to patients with known risks. Too many doctors seem to have been tricked by anti-vax disinformation amplification campaigns that have been aimed at North America. Prime Minister Trudeau recently testified about this in Canada. Not to be confused with the Pentagon’s anti-vax operations which were aimed at Asia, but which probably helped confuse Americans too on the world wide web. Since when does uptake with vaccination not matter? It’s always mattered. The polio campaign in the U.S. was successful because of a concerted effort to do a door to door campaign that started before the vaccine was even available. Successful vaccine campaigns do not pussyfoot around, high uptake is needed. Evolutionary epidemiologist Rob Wallace submitted a public comment to the FDA vaccine committee in January 2023, saying that yearly vaccination as a simplified course is the wrong approach because it would “further handcuff a public health response already limited by abandonment of nonpharmaceutical interventions”. But of course there are no hands to handcuff, the CDC’s hands have been idle in the response to covid. At the June 2024 meeting of this committee, Dr. Denise Jamieson described being “really struck with the low proportion of healthcare providers that recommended – and given what we know about influenza and other vaccines – and the critical role that healthcare providers play in recommending vaccines” and the doctor was worried that “if it were not a universal recommendation – that the role of the health care provider in identifying and appropriately counseling those with risk — that would become even more problematic.” Well we’re there – because restrictions on the spring dose has allowed for some affluent people who are just over 65 to – rightly – get an extra dose before their fancy summer vacations. But meanwhile working class people who are in their early 60s – with cardiac conditions – or diabetes – frontline jobs in retail, food service, or at a crowded DMV, have been prevented from getting that spring dose because of this pointless gatekeeping of safe vaccines just because of cost to big health insurance companies – and when uptake is in the ditch. Do your job. Get vaccines into arms. It’s 2024, where is the progress on vaccine uptake?
(References)
June 2024
Hi I’m Chloe Humbert. We need better vaccine promotion campaigns from our government. The recommendation for a spring covid vaccine boost for seniors was NOT well promoted. Worse, the spring boost excluded 50 to 64 year olds with underlying conditions – people clearly at higher risk of hospitalization or death. At a previous CDC meeting in September 2023, it was mentioned twice that “THERE IS NO GROUP THAT HAS NO RISK OF SEVERE ILLNESS”. The exclusion of 50 to 64 year olds, or any adults, from twice a year OPTION is perplexing since there’s NO evidence of risks that outweigh benefits, especially for people over 50, and there’s been evidence presented at previous meetings of profound waning. Many patients at times fail to heed doctor’s advice, but it’s not a reason to stop encouraging patients to quit smoking, and it’s not a reason to stop promoting vaccination. There is certainly no good reason to restrict access to the next covid vaccine update. And to be clear, catering to private insurance company lobbyists is not a good reason. Of course the recommendation for a spring booster for seniors on Medicare, was not even properly promoted. Uptake for seniors is horribly low and it’s because there are people in their 80s who have not gotten the message, which was the responsibility of the CDC, this is what the public is paying this agency to do. This lack of vaccination campaign is a persistent failure and the anti-vax has been coming from inside the house. The scandalous news about the anti-vax campaign perpetrated by a DOD contractor on behalf of the government is a grotesque pinnacle of our nation’s unacceptable public health failures. This disinformation campaign is reported to have undermined vaccination and also masking and testing. It’s reported that the military psyops campaign was forbidden by law from targeting Americans, but in our world wide web world in a global pandemic, the idea of undermining public health abroad without harming Americans is ridiculous on its face. And harming innocent civilians abroad during a global health crisis is not itself defensible. CDC officials may think this is not the fault or responsibility of the CDC, but that is false. This is not “just some people online” and it’s not a game. Real people are counting on the CDC. Leadership cannot rest on laurels or point a finger elsewhere. Infectious disease doesn’t recognize geopolitical boundaries or federal agency silos. An amends is needed and the CDC should have a distinct and purposeful goal to actually promote public health and lead on vaccination promotion with an active campaign.
February 2024
We need more timely updated covid vaccines and boosters, and specifically ALL people in high risk categories deserve more than yearly access considering the waning of efficacy and the seriousness for those at risk disabled and elderly. Please do not restrict vaccine access based on anti-vax sentiments and political considerations.
September 2023
There are people on this ACIP committee like Cody Meissner, signer of the infamously wrong Great Barrington Declaration,(1) who has in the past voiced incoherently anti-vax opinions and vague opposition to vaccine development.(2) Paul Offit, who is on the FDA’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC),(3) appears to favour restricting vaccines to only the very old,(4) — “focused protection” is something promoted by the Great Barrington Declaration, with the idea of natural herd immunity taking it’s natural course among youths, which of course results in some dying (something that’s only seen as good from a eugenics pseudoscience perspective). Someone anonymous at the FDA was quoted in WaPo as saying they didn’t think they should update boosters for new variants because they believe the public has “little interest in getting repeated injections”(5) — calling them “injections” itself invokes anti-vax talking points. In other words there are people at government agencies who might be anti-vax, or at least believe a majority of the public is anti-vax, and so the government appears to be catering to the anti-vax contingent by restricting vaccine development, frequency, and putting limits on who can get it, for reasons other than a scientific basis.(6) Mike Osterholm was quoted in Stat News saying that public health is trying to “thread the needle” between people who want to be vaccinated and the anti-vaxxers who want nobody vaccinated.(7) Trying to implement policy that’s halfway between Qanon and reality is not rational, and it’s costing people’s lives, because what the government recommends has direct impact on what a lot of healthcare providers do, what insurance covers, and what the public and healthcare workers believe is real.
(references)
Correction note: Cody Meissner is on the FDA VRBPAC committee, not the CDC ACIP committee. (Both are committees on vaccines and vaccination.)
May 2023
The goal should be to get as many people vaccinated as possible. Why has this been forgotten? Why is covid vaccination being restricted? And if we’re supposed to take individual responsibility, why are we not being allowed as citizens to decide what the goal of vaccination should be and therefore allowed to get the vaccine on a schedule that provides maximum benefits? I do NOT want the government deciding that reducing my risks is “not worth it” on some “30,000 feet view” of “good enough” – that’s an egregiously immoral standpoint. I value my life and my health. And I expect my representative government to represent me and the fact that my life has value! Vaccination has shown a reduction in risk of not just death and hospitalization, but a reduction of transmission and a reduction of the risk of long covid. Flu vaccination has been shown to reduce the number of sick days out of work for working age adults, why would you restrict vaccine access to old people only? Even if your only goal is catering to The Economy, restricting vaccines is counterproductive. I’m also concerned that restricting covid vaccines to the very very old, people who are most likely to be hospitalized or die, despite vaccination, will further erode the possible effectiveness of those vaccines, and undermine the public’s view of it, because it will look like vaccination doesn’t work, when in fact, it does work if it’s broadly distributed in a schedule that the data warrants. Vaccines should be offered to all adults on a 6 month schedule according to the data of waning effectiveness, so we can protect ourselves.
