Comment On Tuesday morning, a Fox News contributor claimed on Twitter that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was going to mandate that students get coronavirus vaccines. By Tuesday afternoon, the claim was being repeated by the nation’s most popular cable news show and amplified to millions more on social media. “CDC to add Covid vaccine to childhood immunization schedule, which would make fax mandatory for kids to go to school,” tweeted host Tucker Carlson, sharing a segment from his show that it has been viewed more than 1.5 million times online. . But the claim was wrong: The CDC cannot mandate that students get vaccines, a decision left up to states and jurisdictions, the agency and multiple public health officials said. The original tweet by Nicole Saphier, a radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, also misrepresented a planned meeting of CDC advisers, who voted Wednesday to add coronavirus vaccines to the federal Vaccines for Children (VFC), a safety net program that offers shots at no cost. A separate meeting set for Thursday will review the agency’s immunization schedule for children. Public health experts said there’s a legitimate debate about whether schoolchildren should be required to get vaccinated against the coronavirus — but the Fox News personalities’ inflammatory and incorrect claim is the latest example of how critics can distort the facts about the CDC and the coronavirus, potentially contributing to lower vaccination rates, weakening trust in federal health officials, and other public health consequences. “This is a whole new level of dangerous misinformation,” Jerome M. Adams, who served as the U.S. surgeon general during the Trump administration and as Indiana’s top health official, wrote in a text message to the Washington Post. “It could harm children (by derailing the VFC programme, which helps disadvantaged children access vaccines) and put health workers at risk (due to angry misinformed parents). We need to be able to have honest discussions about the pros and cons of vaccinating children, without resorting to blatant misinformation.” The episode also shows how misinformation about health care can quickly take hold, particularly around the coronavirus vaccine, and is fueled by many Americans’ frustration and confusion with pandemic policies. But public health experts often feel stymied in their response, unsure when to engage with false claims that are spreading virally. And when officials do weigh in, they are often limited by their more deliberate, sometimes bureaucratic processes. “I have been doing vaccine work for more than two decades. And what I’ve seen, thanks to social media, misinformation and misinformation can spread much faster now,” said Julie Morita, executive vice president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and former Chicago public health commissioner. “There is no quick fix for this.” While some outspoken individuals, such as Kavita Patel, a physician and former Obama administration official, took to Twitter Tuesday night to criticize the false claims and refute them point by point, federal officials were more muted in their response. In interviews Tuesday night, several administration officials said they did not plan to address the false allegations, worried about amplifying them. But by Wednesday morning, the administration’s calculus had changed, following Carlson’s department, amid growing anger toward federal health officials as vaccine critics seized on the misreported claim that the CDC was going to mandate the shots for schoolchildren. “Thanks to @GovRonDeSantis, COVID mandates are NOT allowed in Florida, are NOT being pushed into schools, and I continue to recommend against them for healthy kids,” Florida surgeon general Joseph Ladapo tweeted. The CDC took to Twitter around noon Wednesday, citing Carlson’s tweet and noting that the independent vaccine advisory committee will vote Thursday “on an updated childhood immunization schedule.” The tweet also said, “States set vaccine requirements for students, not ACIP or CDC,” and linked to a page explaining state vaccine requirements. The CDC’s response drew criticism from public health experts, who said the agency did not specifically reject Carlson’s claim or speak in plain language. Two administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly said they were uncomfortable that the CDC — citing Carlson’s tweet — inadvertently reinforced the lies in its video. CDC’s independent expert advisory panel meeting focuses on ensuring access to free vaccines for children against COVID — just as we have provided free access to other vaccines for children. these are not vaccination requirements. Any indication to the contrary is untrue. — Secretary Xavier Becerra (@SecBecerra) October 19, 2022 Meanwhile, Saphier’s original tweet was still posted Wednesday afternoon and had been retweeted more than 2,400 times by 6 p.m. Asked about Saphier’s tweet, Fox News pointed to a second tweet he sent, more than nine hours later, that offered context that the states did not. always follow CDC recommendations. This tweet had been retweeted 55 times. Saphier also appeared on a Fox News segment Wednesday afternoon, clarifying her comments but repeating her criticism that children’s vaccines needed further study. Memorial Sloan Kettering said Saphier did not speak for the foundation. In a statement Wednesday, the CDC said the vaccine team will update the 2023 childhood and adult vaccination schedules, including the addition of approved or approved coronavirus vaccines, as guidance to health care providers. “It is important to note that there are no changes to the vaccine policy for COVID-19 and this action will simply help streamline clinical guidance for healthcare providers by including all currently licensed, authorized and routinely recommended vaccines in one document,” said CDC spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund. he said in an email. The revised vaccination schedules won’t go into effect until January 2023. Early next year is also when the federal government will no longer provide the vaccines for free, federal health officials said. The practical impact of including vaccines on the CDC’s recommended immunization list means that they are usually covered by insurance. The updated schedule also “is the one place anyone can look to see exactly what all the recommendations are for all vaccines for all ages,” said James Campbell, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and vice president of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Committee on Infectious Diseases, which said the color document is an essential tool for busy clinicians. Public health experts noted that recommendations issued by the CDC’s advisory committee do not necessarily translate into state-level mandates. For example, few states have adopted the panel’s 2006 recommendation that teenagers be vaccinated against the human papillomavirus, or HPV. The CDC “wanted to stay out” of the vaccination mandates and constantly defers to local officials, said Jason Schwartz, a Yale University associate professor who specializes in vaccine policy. The poll has found a significant partisan divide in perceptions of the CDC and other agencies. Nearly three-quarters of Democrats say they view officials at the CDC and other public health agencies favorably, compared to just a third of Republicans who do, according to a Pew Research poll conducted in September. “This split will make it harder for Republicans to make future vaccines for the coronavirus variants,” said Robert Blendon, a longtime researcher at Harvard University. Health care leaders also said the episode underscored the challenge of informing the public about controversial public health issues. Drew Altman, head of the nonpartisan think tank Kaiser Family Foundation, said his organization is focused on fighting health misinformation “as our next big thing.” “It is not enough for us to be in the business of imparting good information. Now we must also deal with countering misinformation and deliberate misinformation,” Altman said.
