A have a look at the dramatic week on the planet of vaccines and RFK’s Senate listening to : NPR
Well being Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confronted intense questioning throughout this week’s Senate listening to as frustration, confusion, and anger grew amongst lawmakers and residents concerning his controversial vaccine insurance policies
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Well being Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confronted questioning from lawmakers Thursday this week about vaccines, and it was a spectacle. This is one change between Kennedy and Democratic Senator Ben Ray Lujan from New Mexico.
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BEN LUJAN: Mr. Secretary, you select to know solutions to questions with some colleagues [inaudible].
ROBERT F KENNEDY JR: I am keen to provide the reply. I am keen to provide the reply.
LUJAN: Perhaps somebody – Mr. Secretary, somebody ought to have requested you – possibly President Trump ought to have requested you, are you a reliable particular person? And we must always have waited for a solution then. Let’s transfer on.
KENNEDY: I do not even know what you are speaking about.
LUJAN: Mr. Secretary…
KENNEDY: You are speaking gibberish.
SIMON: And we’re now joined by NPR well being correspondent Rob Stein. Rob, thanks a lot for being with us.
ROB STEIN, BYLINE: Good to be right here, Scott.
SIMON: Listening to lasted three hours. What have been the highlights?
STEIN: You understand, Scott, I’ve lined loads of fairly heated congressional hearings, however Kennedy’s grilling was in contrast to something I can bear in mind. Everybody anticipated the Democrats on the committee to go after Kennedy, particularly after he received his CDC director fired as a result of she clashed with him over his vaccine insurance policies, prompting a management implosion on the company, however they have been joined by some Republicans, together with Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming.
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JOHN BARRASSO: Over the past 50 years, vaccines are estimated to have saved 154 million lives worldwide. I help vaccines. I am a physician. Vaccines work. Secretary Kennedy, in your affirmation hearings, you promised to uphold the best requirements for vaccines. Since then, I’ve grown deeply involved.
STEIN: However, you realize, Scott, Kennedy remained combative and defiant all through the listening to, usually, as we heard, shouting over senators as they questioned him and having indignant exchanges about who’s telling the reality.
SIMON: And consistent with that, Rob, are you able to assist us perform a little fact-checking?
STEIN: Positive.
SIMON: For instance, Secretary Kennedy says that youngsters obtain too many pictures, as many as 92 by the point they’re 18. Is that appropriate?
STEIN: Yeah, you realize, that one left loads of consultants scratching their heads. So I checked with the American Academy of Pediatrics, and so they instructed me no, it isn’t correct. Youngsters get not more than 38 vaccine doses for childhood illnesses like measles, mumps, rooster pox, you realize, polio. Perhaps nearer to 50 should you depend annual flu pictures, however that is far fewer than 92. And there is loads of proof that these pictures are very protected and extremely efficient at defending youngsters from illnesses that may be, you realize, very harmful.
SIMON: One other assertion the secretary stored making was that he had performed nothing to restrict entry to vaccines, together with the COVID-19 vaccines. Is that true?
STEIN: Effectively, you realize, nothing he is performed up to now has truly completely pulled any vaccines from the market, however he has made getting a COVID shot lots tougher for lots of people. And that is as a result of for the primary time, the vaccines aren’t accessible to anybody six months and older to simply stroll right into a pharmacy and get. The brand new pictures are actually solely authorized for individuals who face the best hazard of getting actually sick from COVID, you realize, as a result of they’re 65 years outdated or older or have sure different medical points.
SIMON: How onerous is it to get a COVID shot now?
STEIN: You understand, for lots of people, it is most likely means tougher, particularly proper now. In some locations, persons are having a very troublesome time discovering pharmacies that even have the vaccine, and after they do, they’re typically being turned away as a result of they do not meet the brand new guidelines. Typically they cannot even get it in the event that they do meet these new standards, and even when they arrive again with a prescription. You understand, that is partly as a result of the principles differ from state to state, and loads of docs and pharmacies – pharmacists are confused by the brand new guidelines, too.
Now, you realize, Scott, a few of this can most likely ease up within the coming weeks when the up to date pictures come into pharmacies, extra plentiful across the nation and other people get extra accustomed to the brand new guidelines, and presumably after a brand new – and presumably after a key CDC committee points formal suggestions for the COVID vaccines later this month. However, Scott, that committee was hand-picked by Kennedy, so nobody’s certain precisely what they’ll do.
SIMON: NPR well being correspondent Rob Stein. Thanks a lot for being with us, Rob.
STEIN: You guess, Scott.
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