The U.S. Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention (CDC) has chosen Retsef Levi, a member of its key vaccine panel, to steer its COVID-19 immunization workgroup, Reuters reported on August 25. “Levi had critiqued mRNA vaccines previously, saying they’ll trigger critical hurt and demise, particularly amongst kids, and referred to as for his or her instant withdrawal,” Reuters’ Mariam Sunny wrote.
Joseph Choi with The Hill wrote {that a} spokesperson for the Division of Well being and Human Providers (HHS) confirmed that Retsef Levi, professor of operations administration on the Massachusetts Institute of Know-how’s (MIT) Sloan Faculty of Administration, had been chosen to steer the working group.
“Levi was among the many eight new members of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) chosen by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after he fired all standing members earlier this 12 months,” Choi reported.
“The CDC’s COVID-19 working group was created in 2020 to debate immunization suggestions because the pandemic developed. The group is supposed to help the work of the ACIP via the overview of accessible knowledge and scientific data,” Choi famous.
Tristan Manalac with BioSpace reported that the “COVID-19 immunization workgroup will perform as a subgroup of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), as per the company’s doc. The subcommittee will primarily serve ‘to overview related revealed and unpublished knowledge, and scientific and scientific data’ and give you ‘choices’ that it’ll then current to ACIP throughout public conferences to assist the advisory panel craft vaccination suggestions.”
“Levi’s vaccine skepticism was on full show throughout the latest ACIP assembly in June, when the panel was imagined to—however finally didn’t—vote on COVID-19 immunization tips. Even when confronted with proof exhibiting that vaccines containing thimerosal are protected, Levi declined to agree,” Manalac wrote.
Moreover, Manalac reported, “Levi was additionally one in all two panelists who voted in opposition to recommending Merck’s respiratory syncytial virus antibody Enflonsia to be used in infants—a suggestion ACIP finally endorsed.”
