Controversial Vaccine Panel Votes to End Decades-long Universal Recommendation for Hepatitis B Birth Dose

12.05.2025 /Statement

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Anthony Wright, executive director of Families USA, issued the following statement in response to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) vote to change the Hepatitis B vaccine recommendation for newborns, a recommendation that if implemented, will sow confusion among families and ultimately lead to lower vaccination rates and higher infections among young children.

"Today's vote by a panel of unqualified anti-vaccine skeptics will cause harm and heartbreak to infants and their families. Let's not mince words: babies will die if these recommendations are adopted, a tragedy that will be harder to bear because those deaths will have been easily preventable.

"Nothing prompted this change other than politics: no new scientific or evidence-based data supporting this change, no new reported issues, and no known benefit for this change. Some ACIP members themselves questioned the purpose of delaying the newborn dose and acknowledged the lack of evidence supporting these changes - and yet the panel voted to end the universal recommendation anyway.

"The actions of this panel are not just careless, but reckless and dangerous to the public health of our nation. This change in universal vaccine recommendations will cause further confusion among parents and providers, and lead to more disease and death and higher health care costs and burdens for the health system we all rely on. Part of the blame goes to our current Congress who did nothing when Health and Human Services' Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired and replaced the ACIP panel with anti-vaccine ideologues unsuited for the job. Families and vulnerable children will bear the consequences for Congress' inaction.

"We strongly urge acting CDC Director Jim O'Neill to not approve ACIP's recommendation. And beyond that, Congress must stand up to Secretary Kennedy, do its job of oversight, and put an end to his harmful, anti-science agenda before it's too late."