RFK Jr.'s vaccine panel defers vote on hepatitis B shot for babies until Friday

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s hand-picked vaccine committee on Thursday deferred crucial votes on hepatitis B vaccines for babies until Friday, saying it will give members more time to review proposed language on the measure.

One panel member, Dr. Cody Meissner, a professor of pediatrics at the Dartmouth Geisel School of Medicine, brought a motion to defer the votes following confusion amongst the group about the language.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends that every baby get vaccinated against hepatitis B within 24 hours of birth. 

It's unclear if the panel, called the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, could significantly delay or eliminate a so-called birth dose of the shot for babies whose mothers test negative for the virus. The group tabled a vote on the vaccine in September because some members called for a more robust discussion first.

But any change could have wide-ranging consequences: Some public health experts say that having fewer newborns vaccinated against the virus could risk an increase in chronic infections among children. 

Hepatitis B, which can be passed from mother to baby during childbirth, can lead to liver disease and early death. There is no cure. 

"We have a vaccine that is highly effective at preventing an incurable disease. We should take full advantage of that," Neil Maniar, a public health professor at Northeastern University, told CNBC. 

The birth dose recommendation was introduced in 1991 and is credited with driving down infections in kids by 99% since then. Maniar called that a "remarkable success story that we run the risk of reversing" if the committee changes the recommendation. 

Decisions by the panel are not legally binding, as it is up to states to mandate immunizations. But ACIP's recommendations have significant implications for whether private insurance plans and government assistance programs cover the vaccines at no cost for eligible children. 

The panel's upcoming two-day meeting in Atlanta comes after Kennedy earlier this year gutted the committee and appointed 12 new members, including some well-known vaccine critics. During the meeting in September, some advisors raised questions about whether the benefits of the shot outweigh potential safety risks. 

But the jab is "an incredibly safe vaccine with minimal risks," Dr. Sean O'Leary, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Committee on Infectious Diseases, said during a media briefing Tuesday. 

"I never once saw a fever actually associated with hepatitis B vaccine," said O'Leary, who practiced for eight years as a general pediatrician and worked in a newborn nursery. 

The AAP, which publishes its own vaccine schedule, still recommends the universal birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine because "it saves lives," he added.

A new review, published Tuesday, of more than 400 studies spanning four decades also found no evidence that delaying the universal hepatitis B vaccine birth dose improves safety or effectiveness. The review also found that the birth dose does not cause any short- or long-term serious adverse events or deaths.

A 2024 CDC study showed that the current vaccination schedule has helped prevent more than 6 million hepatitis B infections and nearly 1 million hepatitis B-related hospitalizations.

Merck and GSK manufacture the hepatitis B vaccines used starting at birth. Neither of the shots are significant revenue drivers for the companies.

But John Grabenstein, a former Merck vaccine executive and military pharmacist, said a change to the recommendation could cause vaccine supply disruptions for the companies.

"They have build up their reserves, and they build up their thorough calculations so that they can meet the status quo," Grabenstein, who has no remaining financial ties to Merck, told CNBC. "If you disrupt the status quo without warning, then there would be too much of some things and not enough of other things that could easily create spot shortages."

Still, he said his first concern from a public health standpoint is that fewer children will get vaccinated on time, leaving them vulnerable to infection.

Merck during the panel's September meeting also pushed back on changing the recommendation. 

"The reconsideration of the newborn Hepatitis B vaccination on the established schedule poses a grave risk to the health of children and to the public, which could lead to a resurgence of preventable infectious diseases," Dr. Richard Haupt, Merck's head of global medical and scientific affairs for vaccines and infectious diseases, said at the time.