CDC official overseeing COVID-19 vaccine recommendations resigns

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CBS News

June 3, 2025 / 7:33 PM EDT


A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official said Tuesday she was resigning from her role overseeing updates to the agency's COVID-19 vaccine recommendations, following an order by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to force an update to the agency's guidance.

"My career in public health and vaccinology started with a deep-seated desire to help the most vulnerable members of our population, and that is not something I am able to continue doing in this role," Dr. Lakshmi Panagiotakopoulos wrote in an email to some members of the agency's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).

Panagiotakopoulos had served as one of the leads of the work group on COVID-19 vaccines within the ACIP. She sent an email to members of the work group early Tuesday morning to say she was resigning, multiple people who received the email confirmed to CBS News. Reuters first reported news of her resignation. Panagiotakopoulos and a CDC spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The process to update the CDC's influential vaccine recommendations is closely watched by experts because they are tied to federal policies and programs, including liability protections, vaccines for uninsured children and requirements for insurance coverage. The committee had been set to vote on updated recommendations for COVID-19 vaccines at a meeting later this month, before Kennedy usurped the process to impose his own changes to the guidance.

Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-official-overseeing-covid-19-vaccine-recommendations-resigns/

[gab13by13]

1. Someone needs to give us reliable guidance

The new Covid variant coming from China has been found in 6 states and it is more transmissible.

The old Covid vaccines are supposed to still work but it would be nice to have someone like Dr. Fauci back to let us know.

I guess wife and I will schedule our Covid shots.

[mdbl]

2. Well this just lowered the CDC credibility another notch

only a few more to go before it's completely worthless.

[hueymahl]

3. I think we are already there

[CurtEastPoint]

5. surely you are not blaming that on her? It's all on Dump, RFK, etc.

[mdbl]

7. Absolutely.

I feel bad for the people left at the CDC still trying to do a credible job under really shitty leadership.

[CurtEastPoint]

9. Driving through n'hood in Decatur (GA) home of CDC and nearly every house had a sign SAVE THE CDC

[Marthe48]

4. I know 5 people who got Covid since March

Of this year.
I absolutely hate that all of the effort so many of us Americans put into trying to limit the fallout of this virus went for nothing because ignorant criminals wrested control of the government.
Oh well, Covid doesn't care how its host votes, and doesn't exclusively kill Dems. When you think about it, rwnj don't care who they kill, either.

As always, I appreciate the selfless effort from Dr. Panagiotakopoulos and others to keep us healthy. Thank you for your work.

[twodogsbarking]

6. Her name certainly makes her a target for Trump and the other, you know, Morons.

[Blues Heron]

8. Get your masks while you still can, all bets are off with this criminal regime. Good on her for resigning

[not fooled]

11. Yep. Back to masking for me.

And I have my "you're a moron" retort ready at the tip of my tongue for when the inevitable maggot yells something stupid at me in the Costco parking lot.

[IronLionZion]

10. Brain drain

anyone who is experienced, knowledgeable, qualified, and does the job correctly gets forced out. Replaced by MAGA loyalists who will agree to any BS coming from the top.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

12. Maddow Blog-RFK Jr. breaks promise to senators, guts CDC vaccine panel of independent experts

Before his confirmation, the HHS secretary said he’d leave the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices alone. Now he’s doing the opposite.

That an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is behaving like an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is painfully predictable.

But the fact remains that 52 Senate Republicans were given an opportunity to protect Americans from RFK Jr. — and they failed spectacularly.

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-06-10T13:46:55.481Z

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/cdc-vaccine-panel-acip-rfk-jr-kennedy-rcna212007

In early February, when there was still some question as to whether or not the Senate would confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Sen. Bill Cassidy delivered a closely watched speech on the Senate floor. The Louisiana Republican, a physician by trade, not only endorsed the anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist during his remarks, he offered assurances about the future.

“If confirmed, [Kennedy] will maintain the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices — without changes,” Cassidy declared with confidence, pointing to assurances he’d received directly from RFK Jr.

Four months later, as NBC News reported, Cassidy has been proven wrong.

The 17 members of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s independent vaccine advisory committee are being removed from their posts, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Monday afternoon.

.....Complicating matters is the degree to which these new developments add to a radical and dangerous pattern. Indeed, Kennedy’s announcement came just days after pediatric infectious disease expert Dr. Lakshmi Panagiotakopoulos resigned from her position as the co-leader of a CDC working group that advises outside experts on Covid vaccines.

In an email to colleagues, Panagiotakopoulos said, “My career in public health and vaccinology started with a deep-seated desire to help the most vulnerable members of our population, and that is not something I am able to continue doing in this role.”

Around the same time, The Associated Press reported that there’s some ambiguity as to who, exactly, is currently leading the CDC.

A New York Times report added:

Under Mr. Kennedy’s leadership, the F.D.A. has narrowed availability of Covid vaccines to adults 65 and older and Americans with certain underlying conditions. Mr. Kennedy later announced that the C.D.C. would no longer recommend the vaccines for healthy children or pregnant women, a decision that normally would have come from the agency’s A.C.I.P. ... He also oversees the National Institutes of Health, which halted funding for researchers who study vaccine hesitancy and canceled programs intended to discover new vaccines to prevent future pandemics. The department has also ended work crucial to developing an H.I.V. vaccine and a contract for a vaccine against bird flu.

As unsettling as the news has been, none of it is surprising. RFK Jr.’s anti-science reputation was well established long before Trump nominated him. That an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is behaving like an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is painfully predictable.