The Department of Health and Services (HHS) has canceled contracting for the development of a range of vaccines targeted at COVID-19 and the flu.
As the Associated Press’s Amanda Seitz reported in the evening on Tuesday, August 5, “The Department of Health and Human Services will cancel contracts and pull funding for some vaccines that are being developed to fight respiratory viruses like COVID-19 and the flu. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced in a statement Tuesday that 22 projects, totaling $500 million, to develop vaccines using mRNA technology will be halted. Kennedy’s decision to terminate the projects is the latest in a string of decisions that have put the longtime vaccine critic’s doubts about shots into full effect at the nation’s health department. Kennedy has pulled back recommendations around the COVID-19 shots, fired the panel that makes vaccine recommendations, and refused to offer a vigorous endorsement of vaccinations as a measles outbreak worsened,” Seitz wrote.
HHS published a press release to its website on Tuesday afternoon announcing the move, and quoting Secretary Kennedy as stating that “We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted. BARDA is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development investments because the data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu. We’re shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate.”
The press release stated that “The wind-down affects a range of programs including: Termination of contracts with Emory University and Tiba Biotech. De-scoping of mRNA-related work in existing contracts with Luminary Labs, ModeX, and Seqirus. Rejection or cancellation of multiple pre-award solicitations, including proposals from Pfizer, Sanofi Pasteur, CSL Seqirus, Gritstone, and others, as part of BARDA’s Rapid Response Partnership Vehicle (RRPV) and VITAL Hub.Restructuring of collaborations with DoD-JPEO, affecting nucleic acid-based vaccine projects with AAHI, AstraZeneca, HDT Bio, and Moderna/UTMB.”
“Let me be absolutely clear: HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them. That’s why we’re moving beyond the limitations of mRNA and investing in better solutions,” Kennedy said in the press release.
Meanwhile, the New York Times’s Apoorva Mandavilli wrote on Tuesday evening, “It is the latest blow to research on this technology. In May, the Department of Health and Human Services revoked a nearly $600 million contract to the drugmaker Moderna to develop a vaccine against bird flu. The new cancellations dismayed scientists, many of whom regard mRNA shots as the best option for protecting Americans in a pandemic.” And she quoted Scott Hensley, an immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania who has been working to develop an mRNA vaccine against influenza, as saying that “This is a bad day for science.
“First used during the Covid-19 pandemic by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, mRNA shots instruct the body to produce a fragment of a virus, which then sets off the body’s immune response,” Mandavilli wrote. And she noted that, “Unlike traditional vaccines, which can take years to develop and test, mRNA shots can be made within months and quickly altered as the virus changes. The technology won a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2023. But,” she wrote, “it has long been distrusted by vaccine skeptics, and Mr. Kennedy has been sharply critical, once calling Covid shots ‘the deadliest vaccine ever made.’ In a video posted on social media on Tuesday, he claimed falsely that mRNA vaccines do not protect against respiratory illnesses like Covid and the flu, and that a single mutation in a virus renders the vaccine ineffective.”
Meanwhile, TIME magazine’s Chantelle Lee wrote on Tuesday evening that “mRNA vaccines have been credited by public health experts with saving millions of lives during the COVID-19 pandemic, and many infectious disease experts have stressed that years of research have shown the shots are both safe and effective. But HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent vaccine skeptic, claimed in a statement accompanying HHS’s announcement that ‘data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu.’” She noted that the directive will “involve canceling and de-scoping various contracts under the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). The “wind-down” will impact 22 projects that come out to a total of nearly $500 million, according to HHS’s press release.” And she quoted Kennedy as stating that “We’re shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate.”
The Time’s Mandavilli wrote that “Scientists disputed Mr. Kennedy’s claims as inaccurate.” And she quoted Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at the Brown University School of Public Health, as stating that, “By issuing this wildly incorrect statement, the secretary is demonstrating his commitment to his long-held goal of sowing doubts about all vaccines. Had we not used these lifesaving mRNA vaccines to protect against severe illness, we would have had millions of more Covid deaths,” Nuzzo told Mandavilli.
