David Ovalle, Rachel Roubein and Lena H. Sun at WP:
The chair of a new panel of federal immunization advisers selected by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Friday that the group’s “enormous depth and knowledge about vaccines, about science” should be obvious to anyone listening to them work.
But medical associations and scientific experts who watched the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices meetings Thursday and Friday panned the panel’s performance as the group reversed recommendations for coronavirus shots and a combined measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox vaccine.
They said the members were unprepared, misunderstood or ignored key data, and highlighted flawed or inconclusive research often trumpeted by vaccine critics.
“It’s troubling to see the erosion of the committee’s integrity,” Sandra Fryhofer, a physician who spent almost 20 years working with the panel as a liaison from the American Medical Association, told the advisers Friday. “We’re concerned about how vaccine recommendations are being developed by this new panel. Data is being selectively used to justify specific conclusions rather than considering all of the available evidence.”
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Panel member Evelyn Griffin, a physician who advocates against vaccine mandates and has said she has seen a rise in “bizarre and rare conditions” after coronavirus vaccines were introduced, discussed a study that purportedly found prenatal exposure to coronavirus mRNA vaccines induced “autism-like behavior” in male rats. She did not mention that the study was retracted after the publisher found “inconsistencies” in methodology and data.
