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Vote on CDC nominee clinched with change to CDC’s website on vaccines and autism

By CNN

(CNN) — The Senate’s health committee on Thursday pushed back a vote to advance two top health care nominations to the Senate floor but indicated that one, the pick to lead the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, would win the necessary votes after some assurances by the Trump administration — including a change to the CDC’s website on autism and vaccines.

In a statement Thursday, Sen. Bill Cassidy, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said the agency “needs someone who understands that the way to prevent vaccine-preventable diseases is to reassure the public that vaccines are safe and effective.”

After speaking with CDC nominee Dr. Erica Schwartz again and reviewing the transcript of her hearing, Cassidy said, he’s confident “she knows what she is doing and will stand against those who don’t.”

“As a sign of good faith, [the US Department of Health and Human Services] modified the CDC’s autism and vaccines webpage,” Cassidy said. “There is more to do to repair the damage that has been done to the U.S. public health response, but this is a start.”

Cassidy had previously voted to confirm HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after the nominee assured him, as Cassidy said, that “CDC will not remove statements on their website pointing out that vaccines do not cause autism.”

The CDC did not remove that language but in November added a sentence: “Vaccines do not cause autism is not an evidence-based claim.”

As of Thursday, the website reads, “Scientists have not identified the root causes of autism. HHS continues to support rigorous scientific research and will update this page as reliable new evidence becomes available.”

On Thursday, Cassidy also suggested that he had lingering concerns about Sean Kaufman, the nominee to lead the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response.

Cassidy grilled both Schwartz and Kaufman at a committee hearing last week, questioning whether Schwartz would have autonomy in her role after CDC upheaval last year and raising Kaufman’s past remarks about vaccines.

“Any time there is somebody contributing to confusion on immunizations that gives me concern,” Cassidy told reporters on Thursday, referencing Kaufman.

Cassidy lost his reelection bid this year after President Donald Trump endorsed a rival contender and the Louisiana senator sparred with the administration over vaccine rhetoric.

The committee had been expected to vote on Thursday, but the vote was delayed due to attendance issues. At least one Republican, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, was not at the Capitol on Thursday. The committee is expected to reconvene for votes on the health care nominees and the nomination of Keith Sonderling to be secretary of the Department of Labor next week.

Whether Kaufman has the votes to advance remains unclear.

“There are ongoing conversations with the administration on the path forward for Mr. Kaufman’s nomination,” a HELP Committee spokesperson said.

The-CNN-Wire
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Blazes burning with the intensity of ‘atomic bombs’: Europe enters a new era of mega fires

By CNN
(CNN) — The vast blazes ripping through southwestern France burned so intensely they created a powerful, fire-generated thunderstorm. This rare phenomenon is sometimes seen in the kinds of megafires that afflict the US and Canada, but was unprecedented in France, until now — and it’s just one sign that Europe is entering a new fire era, experts say.Europe has always had wildfires, but they are becoming increasingly extreme as the climate crisis tightens its grip. Firefighters in France and Spain are currently trying to tame blazes more ferocious and more erratic than anything they’ve tackled before.This follows from Europe’s record-breaking fire season last year, with experts saying the continent is joining a long list of regions — from Siberia to the Amazon — which now endure back-to-back extreme fire seasons.“We have entered an era of fires that cannot be extinguished,” said Víctor Resco de Dios, lecturer of forestry engineering and global change at the University of Lleida in Spain. “These are fires that burn with the intensity of several atomic bombs.”🔥 CNN Weather app brings you climate news and local weatherWildfires in France have now scorched more than 116,000 hectares (roughly 290,000 acres), making them the largest on record for the country, and there are still months of wildfire season left.“The situation we face today is the hardest we’ve ever recorded, the hardest since the Second World War,” French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday on a visit to Bordeaux. He called the fires “totally unprecedented.”One of the most visceral examples of this was the appearance of fire clouds, or “pyrocumulonimbus,” which formed over the weekend in the Gironde region, near Bordeaux, according to fire authorities.Fire clouds emerge when particularly intense wildfires generate a plume of extreme heat, which rises rapidly into the cooler air above and condenses into towering thunderstorm clouds. These can create their own wind, rain and lightning and transform blazes into erratic and unpredictable self-feeding firestorms.The phenomenon is well documented in Australia, Canada and the US — the Los Angeles fires in 2025 produced a rare tornado, or firenado — but they are not at all common in Europe.The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts said it could not yet say for certain this was France’s first pyrocumulonimbus. “However, if confirmed, its development would highlight the exceptional intensity of the current fire and the extraordinary atmospheric conditions under which it is burning,” said Francesca Di Giuseppe, fire forecast coordinator at the ECMWF.The scale of the fires is also remarkable, experts said. They have scorched huge tracts of land across France and Spain, both of which have requested EU assistance. “A synchronized, multinational wildfire crisis is rare in Europe,” said Stefan Doerr, director of the Centre for Wildfire Research at Swansea University in Wales.The fires are raging near major cities, including one which has torn through the mountainous province of Avila, west of the Spanish capital Madrid, and is now the country’s largest on record, authorities have said.“What is uncommon is the current number of destructive wildfires: fires that spread rapidly, overwhelm fire brigades and force communities to evacuate,” said Guillermo Rein, professor of fire science at Imperial College London. More than 300,000 people have been evacuated across the two countries so far.Complete suppression of fires of this magnitude is almost impossible until the fuel runs out or persistent rain arrives, no matter how many firefighting resources are mobilized, experts say.“In Australia, parts of the US and Canada, there is a general expectation and acceptance of out-of-control wildfires,” said Swansea University’s Doerr. “In Europe there is still a widely held notion that such fires can be entirely prevented.”Why are these fires so bad?Each wildfire is complex and unique and affected by many factors, including land management, terrain and firefighting resources. But extreme weather, made worse by climate change, has been a key driver of Europe’s fires, scientists say.Global warming is bringing stronger swings between wet and dry extremes. It’s a “whiplash effect,” said Matthew Jones, an independent research fellow at the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia in England.Last winter was unusually wet in France and Spain, leading a surge in vegetation growth. Then the weather flipped. Since May, Western Europe has been roiled by a succession of brutal heat waves, which parched the landscape. This heat provided “the ‘crack of the whip’ in the whiplash effect, turning that dense vegetation into highly combustible fuel,” Jones said.As France and Spain brace for their fourth heat wave of the summer, there are fears it may exacerbate and already dangerous situation.‘Dantean scenarios’Extinguishing the current fires completely may take months, authorities have said, but their impacts will linger long after that.The hazardous, smoke-filled skies they produce are harmful to health. Pollution from wildfires is estimated to cause more than 100,000 deaths globally every year.There’s also the damage to economies. These fires are raging near major European cities, affecting tourist hotspots, wine-growing regions and vital defense hubs.More than that, they may change people’s relationship with the land they live on, now they find themselves under the constant threat of uncontrollable fires.Into the future, scientists say we should expect fires — in Europe as elsewhere — to become more frequent and more extreme as long as humans continue to burn fossil fuels and push up temperatures.“It’s difficult to predict how far things might go,” said Resco de Dios, “we will soon be unable to rule out Dantean scenarios like those seen in California or Australia, with fires or fire complexes reaching hundreds of thousands of hectares or even a million hectares.”The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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