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March 16, 2026<\/p>\n
2 min read<\/p>\n
Add Us On Google<\/span>Add SciAm<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Judge temporarily blocks key parts of RFK, Jr.\u2019s effort to overhaul U.S. childhood vaccines<\/p>\n A federal judge on Monday issued a stay on the CDC\u2019s move to reduce the number of routinely recommended childhood vaccines<\/p>\n By Claire Cameron edited by Tanya Lewis<\/span><\/p>\n Photo by Tasos Katopodis\/Getty Images<\/p>\n A federal judge on Monday blocked major parts of Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.\u2019s broad overhaul of U.S. vaccine policy in a decision that sides with six medical groups, including the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), which had challenged Kennedy\u2019s rule changes in court.<\/p>\n U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy in Boston issued a stay on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention\u2019s decision to drop the number of routinely recommended childhood vaccines. The CDC had cut the number of diseases it recommended that all children receive vaccines against from 17 to 11. That decision, made in January, had been widely criticized by public health experts as risking children\u2019s health.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that from the standpoint of the children and the families of this country, they owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Judge Murphy, because he has now injected a degree of clarity into what we should be doing with regard to vaccine recommendations that was a little bit muddied up until now,\u201d said Andrew Racine, the AAP\u2019s president, at a press conference after the ruling was issued.<\/p>\n If you’re enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.<\/p>\n The judge also blocked the appointments of 13 members of an influential independent vaccine advisory board called the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) because they likely violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act. In one of his first acts as head of the Department of Health and Human Services, Kennedy fired all the previous members of ACIP and replaced them. Additionally, Murphy\u2019s ruling temporarily reverses all the decisions made by panelists who had been appointed to ACIP by Kennedy. The medical organizations had argued in their lawsuit that Kennedy\u2019s appointed ACIP members lacked the qualifications necessary to recommend vaccine policy.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have been saying all along, and we continue to say that if we\u2019re going to have vaccine recommendations for the children and families of this country, it has to be based on science,\u201d Racine said.<\/p>\n The panel was set to meet on Wednesday to discuss vaccine policy recommendations, but following the judge\u2019s ruling, the lead counsel for the AAP\u2019s lawsuit questioned whether ACIP would do so.<\/p>\n \u201cHHS looks forward to this judge\u2019s decision being overturned just like his other attempts to keep the Trump administration from governing,\u201d HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon said in a statement.<\/p>\n Editor\u2019s Note (3\/16\/26): This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/p>\n If you enjoyed this article, I\u2019d like to ask for your support. 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I hope it does that for you, too.<\/p>\n If you subscribe to Scientific American<\/span>, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.<\/p>\n In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.<\/p>\n There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you\u2019ll support us in that mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" March 16, 2026 2 min read Add Us On GoogleAdd SciAm Judge temporarily blocks key parts of RFK, Jr.\u2019s effort to overhaul U.S. childhood vaccines A federal judge on Monday issued a stay on the CDC\u2019s move to reduce the number of routinely recommended childhood vaccines By Claire Cameron edited by Tanya Lewis Photo by<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[1336,6768,5678,2000,675,788,1015,2847,789,11340,811,78],"class_list":{"0":"post-46909","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-blocks","9":"tag-childhood","10":"tag-effort","11":"tag-jr-s","12":"tag-judge","13":"tag-key","14":"tag-overhaul","15":"tag-parts","16":"tag-rfk","17":"tag-temporarily","18":"tag-u-s","19":"tag-vaccines"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}On supporting science journalism<\/h2>\n
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