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COVID boosters are latest casualty of Trump's anti-science administration [1]
['Daily Kos Staff']
Date: 2025-05-21
The Food and Drug Administration is set to dramatically pare back access to COVID-19 vaccine booster shots, marking the latest anti-vaccine move from the Trump administration.
Generally, only adults ages 65 and older will be able to get the shot, FDA Commissioner Martin Makary and FDA vaccine division head Vinay Prasad wrote in an article published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine. Adults and children younger than 65 will need to provide one health problem that puts them at greater risk of having complications during a COVID-19 infection in order to qualify for future boosters.
"Although the rapid development of multiple COVID-19 vaccines in 2020 represents a major scientific, medical, and regulatory accomplishment, the benefit of repeat dosing—particularly among low-risk persons who may have previously received multiple doses of COVID-19 vaccines, had multiple COVID-19 infections, or both—is uncertain," Makary and Prasad wrote. "The American people, along with many health care providers, remain unconvinced."
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Martin Makary speaks at the White House on May 12.
Makary and Prasad added, "For all healthy persons—those with no risk factors for severe COVID-19—between the ages of 6 months and 64 years, the FDA anticipates the need for randomized, controlled trial data evaluating clinical outcomes before Biologics License Applications can be granted."
Makary and Prasad have long been critical of COVID-19 mitigation efforts, including masking and vaccinations. Makary, for example, opposed COVID-19 vaccine mandates, while Prasad criticized mask mandates. Makary and Prasad also co-authored a paper that criticized the recommendation that young adults should receive COVID-19 booster shots.
Now, empowered by the Trump administration, they are taking concrete steps to lower the number of people who receive COVID-19 boosters.
This marks the latest anti-vaccine step the Trump administration has taken.
Anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. now leads the Department of Health and Human Services, and in February, he announced he would look into the standard vaccine schedule for children, which helps to prevent dangerous viruses like polio and measles.
Earlier in May, Kennedy also announced that the administration will require placebo testing before new vaccines can be approved. Doctors say placebo testing for vaccines is unnecessary, costly, unethical, and could delay the approval of new vaccines.
“If we have vaccines or treatments that work, it’s wrong to give some research participants nothing,” said Seema Shah, a professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “[F]or many diseases, scientists already know how to measure if the vaccine is giving the immune system the information it needs to fight the disease, and there is no need to use a placebo injection."
When President Donald Trump chose a bunch of quacks to lead the United States’ public health apparatus, doctors and people who believe in science feared the fate of vaccines in the country.
Tuesday’s actions prove that their fears were justified.
“Is the pharmacist going to determine if you’re in a high-risk group?” Dr. Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, told the Associated Press of his fears about the new COVID-19 booster rules. “The only thing that can come of this will make vaccines less insurable and less available.”
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