US EditionUS vaccine advisers vote to end years-long recommendation to vaccinate babies against hepatitis B virus
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices ended the universal newborn hepatitis B vaccine recommendation, citing low infection risk and limited safety data in infants.
- On Friday, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted to end the universal newborn hepatitis B birth-dose recommendation, advising it only for infants with mothers testing positive or unknown status.
- U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reconstituted the panel earlier this year, and committee members cited pressure from stakeholders and concerns about small newborn safety studies.
- Public health data show childhood hepatitis B cases have plummeted since vaccination began, as the vaccine prevents serious liver damage and protects children and infants from liver failure and cancer.
- Medical and doctors groups immediately voiced alarm about the committee's recommendation, warning more children could be infected, while Jim O'Neill, Acting CDC director, will decide later whether to accept it.
- Critics say the panel's overhaul sidelined CDC scientists and elevated anti-vaccine voices, marking a return to a public health strategy abandoned more than three decades ago, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices .
111 Articles
111 Articles
RFK Jr. Panel Suggests a Big Change to Child Immunizations
A federal vaccine advisory committee voted on Friday to end the longstanding recommendation that all US babies get the hepatitis B vaccine on the day they're born, per the AP . If accepted, it would be the biggest change yet to the childhood immunization schedule under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy...
The US has been vaccinating newborns against hepatitis B since 1991 and data shows that over 90,000 deaths have been prevented – What the new guidelines predict
US vaccine advisers say not all newborns need hepatitis B shot
A group of vaccine advisers on Friday scrapped a long-standing recommendation that all US children receive the hepatitis B shot at birth, a major policy win for health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jnr that disease experts say will reverse decades of public health gains. The committee voted to keep the birth dose only for infants whose mothers test positive for the virus, replacing the 1991 universal recommendation that has protected all children …
RFK Jr.’s anti-vax committee is recklessly overhauling childhood vaccine policy
A demonstrator holds a sign outside the Center for Disease Control (CDC) headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, US, on Thursday, December 4, 2025. An influential panel of US vaccine advisers is expected to reverse a longstanding recommendation that babies receive hepatitis B shots within 24 hours of birth, a change public health experts say is all but certain to endanger children. | Megan Varner/Bloomberg via Getty Images The federal government is e…
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