WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday (Aug 5) introduced it might terminate 22 federal contracts for mRNA-based vaccines, questioning the protection of a know-how credited with serving to finish the COVID-19 pandemic and saving tens of millions of lives.
The announcement, made by Well being Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, marks his newest effort to weave vaccine skepticism into the core of US authorities coverage.
“We reviewed the science, listened to the specialists, and acted,” Kennedy stated in a press release.
The well being division’s Biomedical Superior Analysis and Growth Authority (BARDA) is “terminating 22 mRNA vaccine growth investments as a result of the information present these vaccines fail to guard successfully in opposition to higher respiratory infections like COVID and flu”, he added.
“We’re shifting that funding towards safer, broader vaccine platforms that stay efficient whilst viruses mutate.”
The modifications have an effect on Moderna’s mRNA bird flu vaccine – a transfer the corporate itself disclosed in Could – in addition to quite a few different programmes, together with “rejection or cancellation of a number of pre-award solicitations” from pharmaceutical giants Pfizer and Sanofi.
In complete, the affected initiatives are price “practically US$500 million”, the Division of Well being and Human Companies (HHS) stated. Sure late-stage initiatives had been excluded from the transfer “to protect prior taxpayer funding.”
“Let me be completely clear: HHS helps protected, efficient vaccines for each American who desires them,” Secretary Kennedy stated.
“That is why we’re shifting past the constraints of mRNA and investing in higher options.”
