Martin Kulldorff, the chair of the CDC’s influential Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, said that for the public to know whom to trust on vaccine advice, former CDC directors should come forward for “a live public debate on vaccines.”
Kulldorff, speaking at a two-day meeting running through Friday where recommendations on the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR), hepatitis B, and COVID-19 vaccines will be discussed and voted on, said “If they are unwilling to engage in an open and honest debate with the chair of a committee that they are so severely criticizing, then I advise that you should not trust them.”
Kulldorff, along with the other 11 members of the committee, are all new to the panel. Seven of them were assigned in June in the wake of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. dimissing all the previous members. Another five were added a few days ago.
“We are currently experiencing heated controversies about vaccines, and a key question is: Who can you trust?” Kulldorff said at the meeting. “Here is my advice. When there are different scientific views, only trust scientists who are willing to engage with and publicly debate the scientists with other views.”
He also refuted the idea that the panel is against vaccines. “The members of this ACIP committee are committed to reassuring the public and restoring public confidence by removing unnecessary risks and harms whenever possible. That is a pro-vaccine agenda.”
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