The Chicago-based American Medical Association plans to ask a U.S. Senate committee to investigate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to overhaul a key vaccine advisory group, the medical association said in an emergency resolution passed Tuesday.
The House of Delegates of the AMA, which is the nation’s premier doctors group, adopted the emergency resolution at its annual meeting in Chicago. The adoption came just one day after Kennedy, who is the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary, announced that he had removed all 17 members of the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices.
That advisory committee is tasked with making recommendations on the use of vaccines to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which then sets U.S. adult and childhood immunization schedules.
“Today we are prioritizing the restoration of public trust above any specific pro- or anti-vaccine agenda,” Kennedy said in a news release Monday. “The public must know that unbiased science — evaluated through a transparent process and insulated from conflicts of interest — guides the recommendations of our health agencies.”
On Wednesday, one day after the AMA’s emergency resolution, Kennedy announced on social media that eight new members had been chosen for the committee. Kennedy said in the post that the new group includes “highly credentialed scientists, leading public-health experts, and some of America’s most accomplished physicians.” The Associated Press, however, reported Wednesday that the new panel includes a scientist who’s criticized COVID-19 vaccines and it includes a leading critic of pandemic-era lockdowns.Kennedy’s decision to reconstitute the committee has met with sharp criticism, including from the American Medical Association. Kennedy has long been a vaccine skeptic, putting him at odds with doctors and scientists who tout vaccines as lifesaving.
The AMA’s emergency resolution Tuesday also said that it would send an open letter to Kennedy asking him to reverse the removal of the 17 commitee members. And the association said it would “identify and evaluate alternative evidence-based vaccine advisory structures,” according to the resolution.
On Monday, the then-outgoing American Medical Association President Dr. Bruce Scott said in a statement that the advisory committee has long been a trusted source of science and data-driven guidance on vaccines.
“Today’s action to remove the 17 sitting members of ACIP undermines that trust and upends a transparent process that has saved countless lives,” Scott said. “With an ongoing measles outbreak and routine child vaccination rates declining, this move will further fuel the spread of vaccine-preventable illnesses.”
