Category: Health

(WASHINGTON) — As Republicans work to pass President Donald Trump’s reconciliation bill by his July 4 deadline, many are worried about the changes that could be coming to Medicaid.

Medicaid is a joint federal and state health insurance program for disabled and low-income Americans. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services works with state programs to administer Medicaid, which enrolls more than 71.2 million people.

The original measure passed by the House made around $600 billion in cuts to Medicaid, which then faced deeper cuts in the Senate.

New estimates from the Congressional Budget Office project federal spending on Medicaid will be reduced by $1 trillion and that the current version of the bill in the Senate would increase the number of uninsured by 11.8 million by 2034.

The passage of the bill would go against Trump’s repeated promises to keep Medicaid intact.

Health policy experts and health care workers say sharp Medicaid cuts could result in vulnerable Americans no longer being able to receive care, either by losing coverage or by closing the centers that provide such care.

Work requirements could result in lost coverage

The bill imposes new 80-hour per month work requirements on able-bodied Medicaid recipients aged 19 to 64 who don’t have dependents. These requirements include working or other approved activities, such as volunteering.

There are exemptions for parents or guardians of children under age 14 and those with disabilities. Under the bill’s current text, these work requirements won’t kick in until 2026.

An analysis published last week from the UC Berkley Labor Center found that work requirements could have a devastating impact on older Americans, between ages 50 and 64.

Nari Rhee, director of the Retirement Security Program at the UC Berkeley Labor Center and author of the analysis, told ABC News that after age 50, employment becomes increasingly difficult.

For instance, many older workers become physically unable to continue employment until they reach retirement age.

“Most people hope and plan to retire at something like age 65, but life happens and quite often what happens is people start having health issues,” Rhee said. “If you’ve had blue collar work or manual work, often you started working probably in your late teens. And so, by the time you get into your 50s, your late 50s, your body is just really worn out, and you’re not no longer able to work the kinds of jobs that you used to do.”

She added that some older workers who are physically unable to do the jobs they used to do or who were laid off have a hard time finding employment again due to age discrimination.

Additionally, many older adults are responsible for caring for family members including spouses and parents, which may mean leaving the workplace entirely.

“In practical terms, there are all kinds of legitimate reasons why, especially older adults, might not be able to meet the work requirements in terms of actually putting in the number of hours, and that’s before we even get to all the administrative issues,” Rhee said. “Even if you do work, you might not be able to navigate the red tape.”

AARP, an interest group that focusing on issues affecting those 50 and older in the U.S., sent a letter over the weekend to Sen. Majority Leader John Thune and Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer expressing opposition to a provision that would disqualify people who fail to meet Medicaid work requirements from receiving Affordable Care Act premium tax credits.

“This creates a steep coverage cliff for those in their 50s and early 60s — particularly for those nearing retirement or working part-time — who may be left with no affordable coverage option at all.”

Risk of rural hospitals, health centers closing

Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, president of the American Nurse Association, said cuts to Medicaid could force rural hospitals and community health centers to close.

Although Senate Republicans have proposed a $25 billion rural health stabilization fund due to cuts to the Medicaid provider tax, it is unclear if that will be enough to prevent hospitals from closing.

Many rural health care centers receive revenue from patients covered by Medicaid and losing that revenue could be costly.

“These hospitals have been on the verge of tight finances for years, and this could be enough to shut them down,” Mensik Kennedy told ABC News. “If we have cuts to Medicaid, we’re going to see these hospitals start to shutter their doors, and people are going to have to drive three, four, hours to deliver a baby, to go have emergency care to get seen, and that’s got to be unacceptable to everyone.”

Arnulfo De La Cruz, president of SEIU 2015, the nation’s largest long-term care union and California’s largest labor union, concurred, saying cuts to Medicaid would impact states’ ability to provide health coverage and long-term care, particularly for rural and low-income Americans.

“Any cuts to Medicaid, the impact in California would be devastating … Medicaid is really the core of how the long-term care system is structured and funded,” he told ABC News. “Medicaid helps to fund clinics, hospitals, nursing homes, home care — it’s all connected as part of our health delivery system. If you were to dismantle or cut to the extent that they’re talking about, I think you see clinics close, you see hospitals close, you see nursing homes close.”

He went on, “I think it would have a devastating impact on the ability for rural Californians and low-income Californians to be able to access their health care, thereby becoming sicker and having to look to much more high-cost alternatives.”

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(NEW YORK) — Rising temperatures, amplified by climate change, are contributing to an increase in cases of sleep apnea, a condition in which breathing repeatedly stops during sleep, according to a new study published in the journal Nature Communications.

“If temperature keeps rising the way they project it to, the burden and prevalence of sleep apnea may double, increasing by 20-100%, depending on greenhouse gas emission reduction,” Bastien Lechat, the study’s author and a senior research fellow at Flinders University in Australia, told ABC News.

Obstructive sleep apnea, or OSA, affects about 1 billion people globally, and 80% of people who have it are unaware and untreated, according to the American Medical Association. Common symptoms of OSA include loud snoring, daytime tiredness, high blood pressure and headaches upon waking, even if “sleeping” eight hours, according to the Mayo Clinic.

OSA has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease, stroke, dementia, diabetes and depression. People with OSA also have two times greater risk of getting in a car accident, according to Lechat.

The study followed over 115,000 people from numerous countries for up to two years, measuring their sleep quality with below-the-mattress sleep monitors and then cross-referencing this information with weather data to evaluate the relationship between temperature and OSA.

When comparing 80-degree Fahrenheit days to days in the 40s, there was a 40 to 45% increase in the frequency or severity of sleep apnea. The risk was even higher for males and individuals who normally sleep longer or have higher body weight.

Extreme heat can exacerbate OSA by making it even harder to sleep, the study noted. Higher temperatures can disrupt the body’s ability to cool down during the night, which interferes with the natural sleep cycle. This can lead to more frequent awakenings, shallower sleep and worsened airway instability, resulting in more apnea events.

Using existing health-economic models, the researchers estimated over 788,000 healthy years of life were lost or disabled in 2023 due to temperature-related increases in OSA, equivalent to a loss of approximately $68 billion, according to the models.

“When you look at the rate of years of life lost per 100,000 people, this is similar to a disorder like Parkinson’s disease, or bipolar disorder, or similar to low physical activity as a risk factor, so it’s a significant burden,” Lechat told ABC News.

Lechat said that increased access to air conditioning and better diagnosis and treatment of OSA could offset some of the increases caused by climate change.

As our planet warms, heat waves are becoming increasingly more common, having doubled in major U.S. cities since the 1980s, according to the federal government’s Fifth National Climate Assessment.

Overnight low temperatures are rising nearly twice as fast as afternoon highs, and this lack of relief during the night poses a significant health risk — particularly for those without access to air conditioning, according to the assessment.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), made up of members recently hand-selected by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., voted 5-1 on Thursday to recommend against flu vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal.

A few moments before, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee voted 6-0 to recommend all Americans aged 6 months and older receive an annual influenza vaccine.

One committee member, Vicky Pebsworth, abstained on each vote.

Thimerosal is a mercury-based preservative, which is used to prevent microbial contamination of vaccines. Most flu vaccines currently used in the United States contain little to no thimerosal, but both the Food and Drug Administration and the CDC say there is no evidence low doses of thimerosal in vaccines cause harm other than minor reactions at the injection site, such as redness or swelling.

Additionally, a 2010 CDC study found exposure to vaccines and immunoglobulins that contain thimerosal, in prenatal or infant stages, does not increase risk for autism spectrum disorder.

This preservative was previously used in some common childhood immunizations, However, in the late 1990s, federal health agencies, the American Academy of Pediatrics and vaccine manufacturers agreed to reduce or eliminate thimerosal in vaccines as a precautionary measure, which public health experts previously told ABC News gave rise to anti-vaccine groups alleging thimerosal is not safe and fueled speculation that mercury causes autism.

Kennedy, who has promoted vaccine-skeptic views that experts and decades of robust research have refuted, wrote a book in 2014 falsely claiming thimerosal is “toxic to brain tissue” and may cause autism, calling for its removal from all vaccines.

During the ACIP meeting, Lyn Redwood, a former president of Children’s Health Defense, a group that used to be chaired by Kennedy, gave a highly charged presentation as a private citizen. She claimed the preservative was toxic to the brain and refuted evidence-based claims that there has been no proven harm from thimerosal in vaccines.

Her presentation received pushback from ACIP member Dr. Cody Meissner, who was the only member to vote against the recommendation. He said there “is no scientific evidence that thimerosal has caused problems.”

“The risk for influenza is so much greater than the non-existing risk from thimerosal,” he added.

Meissner said vaccines with thimerosal are metabolized as ethylmercury, not methylmercury, which is the form of mercury found in fish and shellfish, and is known to be a neurotoxin.

“I’m not quite sure how to respond to this presentation,” he said. “This is an old issue that has been addressed in the past. Ethylmercury is excreted much more quickly from the body. It is not associated with the high neurotoxicity that methylmercury [is].”

Meissner also added that thimerosal is included in most multi-dose vaccines administered around the world because single-dose vials are more expensive, and removing thimerosal could increase the costs of vaccines.

“Thimerosal is included in most vaccines that are administered around the globe, and that is because single-dose vials are more expensive, and many countries cannot afford a single-dose vial,” Meissner said.

He went on, “I realize ACIP is focused on the United States, but the recommendations that the ACIP makes are followed among many countries around the world and removing thimerosal from all vaccines that are used in other countries, for example, is going to reduce access to these vaccines, it will increase cost.”

Multiple liaisons of medical groups in the committee also questioned in the meeting why Redwood was permitted to present given her limited scientific background and pushed back on the lack of peer-reviewed studies in her presentation.

“This committee has always prided itself on openness, transparency and data and evidence. So I am wondering if we will have an actual scientific presentation with peer-reviewed literature, strong evidence to actually discuss this issue, as many statements have been made here today, without support of science or evidence, but merely opinion,” Dr. Jason Goldman, a liaison for the American College of Physicians (ACP), said in the meeting.

A CDC review of evidence on thimerosal was previously published on the agency’s website — showing no safety risks from the ingredient — but was later taken down. A former CDC official posted a copy of the article online.

“A scientifically rigorous CDC report reviewing the safety of thimerosal was posted for public access and then abruptly removed at the direction of the Office of the Secretary. The removal of this document, which contextualized decades of evidence showing no link between thimerosal and neurotoxicity or autism, raises serious concerns about transparency and the integrity of the decision-making process,” Sean O’Leary, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Committee on Infectious Diseases, said in a statement to ABC News.

Doctors have voiced concern that no longer recommending thimerosal in some flu shots could lead to less people getting vaccinated and fuel further distrust of vaccines.

“Any decrease in the number of flu vaccines available will likely result in fewer people being vaccinated and subsequently more hospitalizations and deaths. Its removal could also signal to the general public unwarranted safety concerns,” O’Leary said.

Another heated exchange in the meeting came during the discussion of flu vaccines when ACIP member Dr. Robert Malone described the 250 flu deaths among children during the most recent flu season as a “modest number.”

“The 250 pediatric deaths, which is, let’s acknowledge, is a modest number fortunately,” Malone said.

This past season saw the highest number of flu deaths among children for a non-pandemic season, and the highest number seen since the 2009 H1N1 global flu pandemic, CDC data shows.

Malone received immediate push back during the meeting. Goldman from ACP said the number of deaths “is not a small number, especially if it’s your own child dying from the vaccine preventable illness.”

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(WASHINGTON) — The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), made up of members recently hand-selected by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., voted 5-1 on Thursday to recommend against flu vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal.

One committee member, Vicky Pebsworth, abstained on each vote.

A few moments before, the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee voted 6-0 to recommend all Americans aged 6 months and older receive an annual influenza vaccine.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee voted on Thursday to recommend infants receive a newer monoclonal antibody shot for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted 5-2 to recommend clesrovimab, made by Merck, for infants 8 months and younger who are not protected by a maternal vaccine.

In a second vote, the committee voted unanimously to update the resolution for the federal Vaccines for Children program to include details about the newly approved antibody shot. About half of all U.S. children are eligible for free or low-cost vaccines.

Usually, the CDC director signs off on the votes for final recommendation but, because there is currently no CDC director, the final decision will go to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

If signed off by Kennedy, clesrovimab will made available along with another RSV shot made by Sanofi/AstraZeneca.

This marks the first vote of the panel since Kennedy dismissed the entire panel and appointed his own hand-selected members.

Currently, RSV vaccines are recommended for pregnant women between 32 and 36 weeks of pregnancy to pass on protection to a fetus, which should last throughout their first RSV season.

For babies 8 months and younger born to mothers who did not receive a maternal RSV vaccine, monoclonal antibody shots are available.

Monoclonal antibodies are proteins manufactured in a lab and mimic the antibodies the body naturally creates when fighting an infection. They do not activate the immune system as would occur with vaccination. The shot is also recommended for a small group of children from 8 months old through 19 months old who are at increased risk for severe RSV.

During the first day of the meeting, on Wednesday, Dr. Georgina Peacock, director of the Immunization Services Division in the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases (NCIRD), shared CDC data showing 57% of infants born between April 2024 and March 2025 were protected from RSV by maternal vaccination or receipt of nirsevimab, the shot made by Sanofi/AstraZeneca.

Dr. Cody Meissner, one of the new ACIP members, described the vaccine and antibody data, showing its real-world impacts as a “truly spectacular accomplishment.”

“People should understand this is a truly spectacular accomplishment and will have enormous impact on public health,” he said.

Another ACIP member, Retsef Levi, expressed some skepticism, saying he wanted to see more data on how efficacy for the maternal vaccine changes over time, adding that RSV is a “tricky” virus that “fools interventions in unexpected ways.”

In response, Dr. Adam MacNeil of the NCRID said vaccine efficacy does wane over time, but the maternal RSV vaccine protects newborns and infants when they’re at their most vulnerable, before they develop more robust immune systems.

The votes comes after the group announced on Wednesday it would review the current childhood immunization schedule.

Martin Kulldorff, the ACIP’s new chair, said two new work groups would be established, one focusing on the cumulative effects of children and adolescents receiving all recommended vaccines on the schedule and another reviewing vaccines that haven’t been examined for more than seven years.

The latter group may discuss whether the hepatitis B vaccine is necessary at birth before a baby leaves the hospital, according to Kulldorff.

“The number of vaccines that our children and adolescents receive today exceeds what children in most other developed nations receive and what most of us in this room received when we were children,” Kulldorff said.

The American Academy of Pediatrics put out a video on Wednesday, saying immunization policy through ACIP is “no longer a credible process” and that it will continue to publish its own vaccine recommendations for children.

In the morning, CDC staff presented data on COVID-19 vaccines, showing safety and efficacy as well as a reduction in hospitalizations and deaths.

For the 2024-25 updated COVID vaccine against emergency department and urgent care encounters, the CDC found 79% effectiveness for children between nine months and 4 years old, 57% effectiveness among children between five and 17 years old and 34% effectiveness for those aged 18 and older.

Kulldorff asked where the data shows COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness from placebo-controlled trials. Dr. Adam MacNeil, from the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases (NCIRD), said the CDC’s evaluation of effectiveness came from real-world data.

“Randomized clinical control trials are not necessarily comparable to what we’re currently seeing with the vaccine,” MacNeil said. “Where we’re trying to now monitor is the real-world impacts of these vaccines as opposed to clinical trial data, which was certainly extensively documented.”

The ACIP members also discussed questions about potential safety signals surrounding the COVID vaccine, with the CDC determining that myocarditis and pericarditis — inflammation of the heart muscle and the sac around the heart, respectively — are still risks, but no other risks have been found.

ABC News’ Sony Salzman contributed to this report.

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(OHIO) — Republican lawmakers in Ohio are planning on introducing a bill on Wednesday that would ban almost all abortions and criminalize the procedure.

The “Ohio Prenatal Equal Protection Act” would overturn the amendment to the Ohio constitution, voted on in 2023, that establishes “an individual right to one’s own reproductive medical treatment, including but not limited to abortion” before viability.

Reproductive medical treatment includes contraception, fertility treatments and miscarriage care.

Abortions are currently allowed up to 20 weeks since fertilization, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that studies sexual and reproductive rights.

“[It] is a very, very simple and beautiful piece of legislation in that all it does is identify all human beings as persons deserving equal protection of the law, both born humans and pre-born humans,” anti-abortion advocate Austin Beigel, with End Abortion Ohio, told ABC News. “So, it identifies those personhood rights starting at the moment of fertilization, when the new distinct organism is formed, the new human life that being that person now has equal protection under the law.”

Kellie Copeland, executive director of Abortion Forward, which helped pass the 2023 amendment in Ohio, said the bill goes against the will of voters.

“This is the most extreme and anti-life legislation that you can imagine,” she told ABC News. “It would strip Ohioans of their constitutionally guaranteed right to bodily autonomy, and that’s the goal of this legislation.”

When Beigel was asked if he was concerned that the bill may go against the will of the voters, he said he was not because “the will of the voters was evil.”

“In many times in our country’s history, the majority of people have desired evil things. We have discriminated horribly against the Black man and woman, and people wanted that,” he continued. “So, I have no qualms about saying I oppose the majority of the will of the people when the people desire something that is evil.”

Copeland replied that “subjecting people to the loss of bodily autonomy, taking basic human rights away from Ohioans is the real evil that we’re talking about here.”

Beigel said he has been working with Republican state Reps. Levi Dean and Jonathan Newman on the bill, which uses the U.S. Constitution’s equal protection clause — part of the Fourteenth Amendment — to override Ohio’s constitutional amendment. Beigel said the co-sponsors will be announced on Wednesday.

Dean’s and Newman’s offices did not immediately return ABC News’ request for comment.

The bill would ban abortion with no exceptions for rape or incest. The only exceptions would be for a spontaneous miscarriage or to save the life of the pregnant woman.

The bill would also criminalize those who have abortions, not just the providers who perform the procedure.

Copeland she is worried the bill could lead to attacks on people who support abortion rights or who underwent abortions.

“When people equate reproductive health care with murder, that kind of rhetoric invites violence,” Copeland said. “It invites violence that we have seen at abortion clinics that we have seen perpetrated against abortion providers.”

Beigel said the bill does not outlaw contraception and is not designed to outlaw in-vitro fertilization (IVF).

However, he did say that IVF may not be able to function the way that it does now if the bill is passed because it would apply equal protection to “pre-born humans.”

“The courts are going to have to debate the implications of this,” he said. “Is it actually moral to freeze a young human being in a cryochamber and preserve them at the age they are and not let them grow?”

Ohio’s history of abortion bills

In 2019, Ohio lawmakers passed a so-called heartbeat bill that bans abortions after cardiac activity can be detected, which occurs as early as six weeks of pregnancy, before many women know they’re pregnant. It was signed into law by Gov. Mike DeWine.

The ban had no exceptions for rape or incest. The only exceptions were cases of ectopic pregnancies and to prevent the mother’s death or impairment of a major bodily function.

A federal judge blocked the ban in 2019, but it was reinstated just hours after the Supreme Court decision to overrule Roe v. Wade.

In September 2022, an Ohio lower court granted a temporary restraining order before granting a preliminary injunction a few weeks later. In December 2023, the state’s Supreme Court dismissed the state’s appeal and sent the case back to the lower courts.

In November 2023, 57% of voters approved the passing of the amendment, adding abortion protections to the state constitution.

Much of the six-week ban was rendered unconstitutional after the amendment went into effect in December 2023, Ohio’s Attorney General Dave Yost said earlier this year.

However, some lawmakers have tried to maintain other parts of the ban, including reporting requirements and a 24-hour waiting period before an abortion can be administered. An Ohio judge temporarily blocked the 24-hour waiting period in August 2024.

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(NEW YORK) — Kraft Heinz announced on Tuesday that it would be removing artificial food dyes from its products within the next two years.

The company said 10% of its products currently contain FD&C color additives, which are approved for use in food by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including brands such as Crystal Light, Jell-O and Kool Aid.

Pedro Navio, North America president at Kraft Heinz, said in a statement that the company removed artificial colors, preservatives and flavors from its Kraft macaroni and cheese in 2016 and that its Heinz tomato ketchup has never had artificial dyes.

“As a food company with a 150+ year heritage, we are continuously evolving our recipes, products, and portfolio to deliver superiority to consumers and customers,” Navio’s statement read, in part. “The vast majority of our products use natural or no colors, and we’ve been on a journey to reduce our use of FD&C colors across the remainder of our portfolio. … Above all, we are focused on providing nutritious, affordable, and great-tasting food for Americans and this is a privilege we don’t take lightly.”

It comes after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. unveiled a plan in April to start phasing out eight synthetic food dyes in the American food supply.

At a news conference announcing the plan, FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said health agencies were looking to revoke authorization for two synthetic food colorings and to work with the food industry to eliminate six remaining synthetic dyes used in a variety of food products.

Kennedy said the agencies had reached an “understanding” with major food companies to voluntarily remove artificial food dyes from their products. It’s unclear what action Kennedy could take if the companies don’t comply.

Shortly after Kennedy’s announcement, PepsiCo’s CEO said on an earnings call that the company had already begun phasing out artificial colors. In-N-Out also announced in May it was removing artificial food dyes from menu items.

Other companies, like Kellogg’s, have previously stated their products are safe for consumption, and they are following federal standards set by the FDA.

Last month, the FDA approved two dyes and expanded approval of a third, meaning it can now be used in a wider range of food products.

Some studies have linked dyes to behavioral changes in children as well as to cancer in animals, suggesting this could extend to humans.

Some nutritionists and dietitians say that it’s best to avoid artificial food dyes, while others say more research needs to be done and the potential negative effects are still unclear.

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(NEW YORK) — A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled on Monday that directives from the Trump administration that led to the cancellations of several research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) were “void” and “illegal.”

U.S. District Judge William Young said the cancellation of the grants — related to studies involving LGBTQ+ issues, gender identity and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) — violated federal law, saying it was a case of racial discrimination and discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community, according to the plaintiffs in the case.

Two lawsuits had been filed against the administration: One led by the American Public Health Association and the other filed by a group of 16 states. Some estimates have suggested that up to $1.8 billion in research funding had been cut.
Young, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, said he was ordering the NIH to restore the grants that were terminated.

In a statement, Andrew Nixon, the director of communications for the Department of Health and Human Services, said the agency stands by its decision to end funding for research “that prioritized ideological agendas over scientific rigor and meaningful outcomes for the American people. Under the leadership of Secretary Kennedy and the Trump administration, HHS is committed to ensuring that taxpayer dollars support programs rooted in evidence-based practices and gold standard science – not driven by divisive DEI mandates or gender ideology.”
Nixon said HHS is “exploring all legal options, including filing an appeal and moving to stay the order.”

Among the plaintiffs is Dr. Brittany Charlton, an associate professor at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, who had all her grants terminated by the NIH.

One of the terminated grants focused on documenting obstetrical outcomes for lesbian, gay and bisexual women and another focused on how discriminatory laws impact mental health among LGBTQ+ teens.

“As a plaintiff, I felt truly seen — it was a rare moment when the deep harm caused to researchers and the communities we serve was acknowledged out loud, in front of the world,” Charlton told ABC News in a statement.

“Sitting there, I felt a wave of relief and hope as the judge condemned the government’s actions and ordered the grants to be reinstated,” the statement continued. “After so much uncertainty and disruption, it finally felt like justice and the value of our research — and the communities at its heart — were being affirmed.”

The terminations came after President Donald Trump passed a flurry of executive orders including vowing to “defend women from gender ideology extremism” and aiming to dismantle DEI initiatives.

According to termination letters sent to researchers at various universities that were reviewed by ABC News, the administration said the canceled projects do not serve the “priorities” of the current administration.

“Research programs based on gender identity are often unscientific, have little identifiable return on investment, and do nothing to enhance the health of many Americans. Many such studies ignore, rather than seriously examine, biological realities. It is the policy of NIH not to prioritize these research programs,” some of the termination letters read.

“The premise…is incompatible with agency priorities, and no modification of the project could align the project with agency priorities,” the letters continued.

ABC News’ Sony Salzman contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — The U.S. Food and Drug Administration expanded its approval of Moderna’s respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine on Thursday to include adults under the age of 60 at increased risk of the disease.

Previously, the vaccine, known as mRESVIA, had been licensed for use for those aged 60 and older.

Approval for mRESVIA came after Moderna conducted a late-stage clinical trial showing the vaccine helped boost immune responses in younger adults.

More than one-third of adults between ages 18 and 59 have at least one underlying condition that puts them at increased risk of RSV, according to Moderna.

“RSV poses a serious health risk to adults with certain chronic conditions, and today’s approval marks an important step forward in our ability to protect additional populations from severe illness from RSV,” Stéphane Bancel, CEO of Moderna, said in a press release. “We appreciate the FDA’s review and thank all the participants in our clinical trial as well as the Moderna team for their dedication to protecting people against RSV.”

Although the FDA approves vaccines and may expand approvals for certain age groups, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sets recommendations regarding who should get vaccines and when.

Currently, the CDC recommends RSV vaccination only for those aged 75 and older and for those aged 60 and over at increased risk.

The CDC’s independent vaccine advisory committee will need to vote to recommend that the new age group be eligible for the shot, followed by a final recommendation from the director of the CDC.

Earlier this week, Kennedy removed all 17 sitting members of the committee and replaced them with eight new members. It remains unclear how the new members of the panel will decide to approach recommendations for the RSV vaccine.

As of Friday, the CDC director role remains vacant and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been making final recommendations. In an April meeting, the prior advisory committee voted to recommend RSV vaccination for those aged 50 to 59 with increased risk of disease, but Kennedy did not adopt the recommendations.

Instead, it appears Kennedy plans to have the new committee re-discuss the recommendations for RSV vaccination as well as discuss HPV and COVID vaccinations in their meeting scheduled to be held between June 25 and June 27

Moderna’s RSV vaccine is based on mRNA technology, which some of the new members have expressed skepticism about, especially in relation to COVID-19 vaccines.

Despite availability, RSV vaccination has been lagging. As of April 26, the latest date for which CDC data is available, an estimated 47.5% of adults aged 75 and older and 38.1% of adults aged 60 to 74 with a high-risk condition reported ever having received an RSV vaccine.

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(NEW YORK) — Prior to becoming Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had espoused the idea of “medical freedom,” the ability of people to make personal health decisions for themselves and their families without corporate or government coercion.

It’s an idea supported under Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement to reduce the prevalence of chronic disease in the U.S. by making healthier lifestyle choices.

On topics, such as vaccines, Kennedy has said he wouldn’t prevent children from being able to receive vaccines but would leave the choice up to parents.

“I’m a freedom-of-choice person,” Kennedy told Fox News host Sean Hannity during an interview in March. “We should have transparency. We should have informed choice, and if people don’t want it, the government shouldn’t force them to do it.”

Some public health experts told ABC News, however, that the HHS has been limiting choices on some products for many Americans despite Kennedy’s talk about “freedom of choice.”

Just last week, Kennedy announced the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would no longer recommend the COVID-19 vaccine for certain groups.

Additionally, Kennedy has called on states to ban recipients of food stamps from being able to use them to purchase soda. He has also praised states for banning fluoride from public drinking water and indicated he will change federal guidance on recommending adding fluoride.

The public health experts said Kennedy’s actions are setting up a dichotomy on public health.

“I think that RFK Jr. has done a really good job of identifying some of the problems [in public health], but it’s the solutions that are problematic,” Dr. Craig Spencer, an associate professor of the practice of health services, policy and practice at Brown University School of Public Health, told ABC News. “What you’re seeing with RFK Jr. and his approach to health is an individualization of public health. It’s this idea that you can make decisions for your health, and that’s always been true.”

He went on, “We need to be able to follow their guidance, not just have them tell us, ‘Follow your own science.’ As the focus shifts from community to individuals, we’re losing a lot of that underpinning, which has led to a lot of the gains in public health.”

Limiting access to COVID-19 vaccines

Kennedy has repeatedly stated that he is not anti-vaccine and that he supports vaccination.

Shortly after Trump’s election, Kennedy said in an interview with NBC News that “if vaccines are working for somebody, I’m not going to take them away. People ought to have choice, and that choice ought to be informed by the best information.”

During his confirmation hearings, Kennedy said he supported the childhood vaccination schedule and that he would not do anything as head of HHS that “makes it difficult or discourages people from taking vaccines.”

Separately, in an opinion piece Kennedy wrote for Fox News in March on the nationwide measles outbreak, he said the measles vaccine helps protect individuals and provides “community immunity” but also called the decision to vaccinate a “personal one.”

However, last week, Kennedy announced the removal of the COVID-19 vaccine from the CDC’s immunization schedule for “healthy children and healthy pregnant women.”

The CDC’s immunization schedule is not just a guide for doctors but also determines insurance coverage for most major private plans and Medicaid expansion programs. Following Kennedy’s announcement, the schedule was updated noting all children would be eligible for COVID vaccines, but now under a shared-clinical decision-making model — allowing parents to choose whether their children are vaccinated alongside advice from a doctor.

“Regarding the vaccines, HHS is restoring the doctor-patient relationship,” HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon told ABC News in a statement. “We are encouraging those groups to consult with their health care provider to help them make an informed decision. This is freedom of choice.”

“If you restrict access, you necessarily restrict choice,” Dr. Matthew Ferrari, a professor of biology and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics at Pennsylvania State University, told ABC News. “Those two things are antithetical. You can’t do both. You can’t say you’re allowing choice if you’re restricting access.”

Ferrari said the idea of “medical freedom” is catchy, but public health recommendations are made based on how to protect the most vulnerable individuals.

“If you look at the outcomes, if you look at the consequences of that movement, it has been to disproportionately restrict access to — and restrict support and infrastructure to allow people to access — preventive medicine,” he said. “It’s sort of easy to say, ‘Well, take the vaccine away. But [vaccines] prevent a future outcome of illness for yourself and for others in the community.”

Traditionally, the CDC’s Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices decides if there is a benefit to a yearly vaccine and who should get it. The independent advisory committee then makes recommendations to the CDC, which has the final say. The committee was set to meet in late June to vote on potential changes to COVID vaccine recommendations.

Spencer said Kennedy’s bypassing of traditional avenues when it comes to changing vaccine recommendations is also taking away choice from people.

“This did not go through the normal process that it should have, and he basically just made a decision for people while at the same time saying that he’s going to let people make a decision,” Spencer said.

Restricting foods under SNAP

Kennedy has also campaigned to prevent Americans from using food stamps — provided under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — to buy candy and soda.

“It’s nonsensical for U.S. taxpayers to spend tens of billions of dollars subsidizing junk that harms the health of low-income Americans,” Kennedy wrote in an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal last September.

At a MAHA event in late May, Kennedy said the governors of 10 states have submitted waivers to the United States Department of Agriculture requesting permission to ban SNAP recipients from using benefits to buy candy and soft drinks.

“The U.S. government spends over $4 trillion a year on health care,” Nixon said in a statement. “That’s not freedom — it’s failure. Secretary Kennedy is unapologetically taking action to reverse the chronic disease epidemic, not subsidize it with taxpayer dollars. Warning Americans about the dangers of ultra-processed food isn’t an attack on choice — it’s the first step in restoring it.”

Nutrition experts agree that sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) are unhealthy. Frequent consumption of SSBs is linked to health issues such as weight gain, obesity, type 2 diabetes, tooth decay, heart disease and kidney diseases, according to the CDC.

Kristina Petersen, an associate professor in the department of nutritional sciences at Pennsylvania State University, told ABC News there is a crisis of diet-related diseases in the U.S., which increase the risk of disability and reduces lifespan.

However, she said there needs to be strong evidence of the benefits of restrictive policies if they are to be put in place.

“In terms of limiting people’s choices, it is important to consider all the different roles that food plays in someone’s life, and so obviously we want people eating nutritious foods, but also we need to acknowledge that food is a source of enjoyment,” Petersen said. “A lot of social situations revolve around food. So, when we’re thinking about reducing people’s access to given foods, we need to think about the consequences of that.”

One unintended consequence could be an eligible family not signing up for SNAP benefits because of the restrictions, she said.

Even if a ban on buying candy and soda with SNAP benefits does occur, Petersen said she is not aware of any evidence that shows banning certain foods leads to healthier diets.

She added that the nation’s dietary guidelines are written to emphasize healthy foods like fruits and vegetable rather than telling people to avoid or restrict less healthy foods.

“All foods can be consumed as part of a healthy dietary pattern. It’s really just the amount and the frequency that determines whether that pattern is helpful overall or less helpful,” Petersen said. “People can have small indulgences, but really, we’re interested in what is their pattern over a period of time.”

Providing incentives for purchasing healthier foods may be more effective and still allow people to have choice, Petersen said.

A 2018 study used a model simulation to study the effects of food incentives, disincentives or restrictions in SNAP.

One of the simulations involving incentives for foods such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, whole grains, fish and plant-based oils found to have the most substantial health benefits and be the most cost-effective.

“Things like fruits and vegetables, they do tend to be more expensive, so if you incentivize them by providing more benefits … that’s making the dollar go further, and it’s kind of making the economic piece of this a bit stronger,” Petersen said. “A lot of this is framed around personal choice. Rather than restricting access to, how can we give people more access to healthy foods? I think that’s going to have the greatest benefit here.”

ABC News’ Youri Benadjaoud and Cheyenne Haslett contributed to this report.

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