Trump Orders CDC to Cut Number of Recommended Childhood Vaccines

President Trump signed an executive order Friday that directs the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to align with a scientific assessment released earlier this year by the Department of Health and Human Services that calls for fewer childhood vaccines.

The move follows a December memo from Mr. Trump directing HHS to align U.S. childhood vaccine recommendations with best practices from peer developed countries. In early January, HHS released an assessment that determined the United States recommends more childhood vaccines than any peer nation and more than twice as many vaccine doses as some European nations.

Following that assessment, the CDC announced updated recommendations in January that would reduce the number of recommended immunizations for children from 17 to 11. The move prompted heavy criticism from medical experts and health organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, which released its own childhood vaccine recommendations and broke with the CDC guidance.

Friday's executive order directs the CDC and its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to review the HHS January scientific assessment and the latest clinical data and take any appropriate steps to update the United States childhood and adolescent vaccine schedule.

By signing today's Executive Order, President Trump is reaffirming his commitment to gold-standard science, ensuring Americans receive the best possible medical advice, and empowering patients and doctors with maximum flexibility, the White House said in a fact sheet accompanying the order.

In the CDC's January recommendations, only children in high-risk categories should receive immunizations for respiratory syncytial virus, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, dengue, meningococcal ACWY and meningococcal B. The CDC kept recommendations in place for 11 childhood diseases: measles, mumps, rubella, pertussis, tetanus, diphtheria, Haemophilus influenzae type b, pneumonia, polio, human papillomavirus and varicella.

In December, the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted to recommend that the first dose of the hepatitis B vaccine be delayed until a child is 2 months old if the mother tested negative for the virus. The current panel was chosen by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after he ousted all 17 members of the previous panel.

In March, a judge ruled against the new HHS childhood vaccine schedule recommendations in a lawsuit brought by the American Academy of Pediatrics and others, finding that Kennedy's moves to appoint the new panel violated federal law. The Trump administration has argued that American children tend to be recommended for more vaccines than children in some other developed countries, particularly in Europe. The American Academy of Pediatrics has argued that most developed countries have broadly similar practices and any differences are due to country-specific factors.