A member of President’s Trump first administration has come forward to criticize Department of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s recent decision to cut vaccine research.
Jerome Adams, who served as surgeon general during Trump’s first term, warned in a post on X that Kennedy’s decision will “cost lives.”
“I’ve tried to be objective & non-alarmist in response to current HHS actions — but quite frankly this move is going to cost lives,” Adams said. “mRNA technology has uses that go far beyond vaccines … and the vaccine they helped develop in record time is credited with saving millions.”
On Tuesday Kennedy announced that the department will cancel contracts and pull funding for some vaccines that are being developed to fight viruses like covid-19.
Kennedy said that 22 projects looking to develop vaccines using mRNA technology will be halted. The projects total $500 million.
Kennedy criticized mRNA vaccines in a video posted to his social media accounts, saying that these types of vaccines don’t perform well and can prolong pandemics.
Medical experts, however, have sharply criticized Kennedy’s decisions, saying that mRNA technology is safe, and that this decision will make it harder to prevent any future pandemics.
“I don’t think I’ve seen a more dangerous decision in public health in my 50 years in the business,” Mike Osterholm, a University of Minnesota expert on infectious diseases and pandemic preparations, said to the Associated Press earlier.
Adams agreed with the sentiment, writing in a follow-up post on X that “mRNA research helped develop covid vaccines in record time — saving millions of lives. Cutting half a billion in mRNA funding, as HHS Sec. Kennedy proposes, isn’t just bad policy — it’s dangerous.”
“mRNA vaccines weren’t ‘rushed.’ They were built on decades of research funded by NIH, DARPA, and global scientists,” he added.
Adams noted that the technology is being used to develop vaccines for RSV, HIV, cancer and other health issues.
“We should be doubling down on what works – not defunding it,” he said. “And we need constructive dialogue vs destructive idealogues.”
