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‘Babies are at risk’: Health reporter breaks down CDC panel’s new Hepatitis B vaccine rules

By WTOP Staff

The health community is in an uproar following a Friday vote by a federal vaccine committee ending a decades-long recommendation that all newborns be immunized at birth against hepatitis B.

The Centers for Disease Control committee was handpicked by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who generally opposes vaccines.

“This is a defining moment for public health in this country. It is for the first time that we can no longer count on our federal agencies to provide us scientifically sound information,” Michael Osterholm, a public health expert at the University of Minnesota, said after the announcement.

“Whatever we hear from this group has to be discounted.”

Apoorva Mandavilli, a science and global health reporter for the New York Times, joined WTOP’s Ralph Fox on Saturday to go deeper into the decision.

Read and listen to the interview below.

The transcript below has been lightly edited for clarity.

Tools to fight hantavirus show promise despite limited funding. Now researchers hope to continue

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — When a rare but deadly rodent-borne virus struck passengers on a cruise ship and seemed to be spreading, there were no treatments for those who fell ill and no vaccines to protect others. That was the case even though it wasn't a novel germ that the world had never seen before, like the virus that caused the coronavirus pandemic. It was a hantavirus, one of a family of viruses that have been known for decades and are thought to exist around the world. Teams of researchers, including in Chile, Argentina and the United States, have long been trying to find and develop drugs and vaccines. But because the viruses are relatively rare and don't spread easily between people, there hasn't been enough sustained investment by governments, global health groups, or drug companies to pay for the extensive safety and efficacy testing needed to make them available. Still, there have been some promising developments. Researchers on Wednesday published a hint that a drug used for an autoimmune disease may help hantavirus patients fight off the most deadly symptoms.
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