This article was originally published by The Epoch Times: States Form Health Alliance to Counter CDC
The states will develop vaccine recommendations that are based on science, officials say.
Three states on Sept. 3 said they’re forming a new alliance to counter updated federal vaccine recommendations.
California, Washington state, and Oregon said their new alliance will develop evidence- and science-based recommendations for immunizations amid concerns over updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The CDC has become a political tool that increasingly peddles ideology instead of science, ideology that will lead to severe health consequences,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, said in a statement. “California, Oregon, and Washington will not allow the people of our states to be put at risk.”
A spokesperson for the CDC’s parent agency, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which is led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said that “Democrat-run states that pushed unscientific school lockdowns, toddler mask mandates, and draconian vaccine passports during the COVID era completely eroded the American people’s trust in public health agencies.”
The spokesperson added that the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee “remains the scientific body guiding immunization recommendations in this country, and HHS will ensure policy is based on rigorous evidence and Gold Standard Science, not the failed politics of the pandemic.”
The CDC, following orders from Kennedy, in May stopped recommending COVID-19 vaccines to healthy children and pregnant women.
The Food and Drug Administration, another division overseen by Kennedy, more recently withdrew emergency authorizations for the shots and limited updated approvals to, in addition to the elderly, younger people who have a risk condition.
Some medical groups and states have criticized the moves. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that all children aged 6 months to 23 months receive a COVID-19 vaccine, as well as many other children not covered by the CDC’s recommendations. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists advised all pregnant women to take a vaccine.
Officials with California, Washington state, and Oregon also noted the removal of all members from the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, the firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez, and the subsequent resignations of several top CDC officials over Monarez’s termination and disagreements over vaccine policy, including the breadth of the advisory panel’s forthcoming review of COVID-19 vaccines.
The state officials said they will align their immunization recommendations based in part on advice from national medical organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics.
“This will allow residents to receive consistent, science-based recommendations they can rely on—regardless of shifting federal actions,” they said.
The states, along with Nevada, previously formed a workgroup during the pandemic that studied COVID-19 vaccines.
Some states in the eastern United States, including Massachusetts, met recently in Rhode Island to discuss coordinating vaccine recommendations. “We’re going to make sure that people get the vaccines they need—no matter what the Trump Administration does,” Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said in a statement.
The announcement from the western states came on the same day that Florida officials said they were planning to end all vaccine mandates, including for schoolchildren, and several days after the New Mexico Department of Health in a public health order said it was committed to making sure residents had access to COVID-19 vaccines.
Pharmacies had stopped providing, or began providing to only certain populations, COVID-19 vaccines in some states in recent days following the FDA’s moves.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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