Fool's Gold Standard Science?
The childhood vaccine schedule got overhauled. The science didn't change. The politics did.
I needed to give myself 24 hours to process the haphazard demolition of the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule.
We had just dipped our toes into 2026. Was my TV still playing The Twilight Zone? Was I about to be shaken awake by a bunch of pig-faced surgeons whispering that I’m the ugly one? AM I?!
“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man’s fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call... RFK Jr.’s HHS.”
Many people and organizations have done excellent write-ups of what actually changed. The Evidence Collective (which I co-founded) put out a rapid response brief. CIDRAP’s Vaccine Integrity Project, STAT News, and the AP all covered it well. I’m not going to rehash the technical details here.
Instead, I want to share a few observations that have been rattling around in my head. Let’s discuss…
1. The timing could not be worse.
We are in the middle of the worst flu season in 25 years. Doctor visits for flu-like symptoms have reached their highest level since 1997-98. Four children have already died from the flu in my state of Massachusetts alone this season. Nationally, we’re on track to exceed last year’s 280 pediatric flu deaths, already the highest in a non-pandemic year.
Measles cases have topped 2,000. Whooping cough infected nearly 28,000 people last year.
The timing here is perfectly, spectacularly wrong.
2. Even those of us “in the know” are genuinely confused.
And I think that might be the point.
We’ve been told that vaccines will still be covered by insurance. Okay, great. But what about families who want the second HPV dose? What about parents who want to vaccinate their child before age 11? What about the pediatrician who now has to figure out which vaccines to stock, which to order on request, and how to document “shared clinical decision-making” for every single shot that used to be routine?
Nobody has clear answers. And when nobody has clear answers, people default to doing nothing.
3. “Shared clinical decision-making” is a euphemism.
It sounds so reasonable. So collaborative. So empowering.
But in practice, it means something closer to: “I mean, you could get this vaccine, but we don’t think you really have to.”
Aaron Siri, the attorney who has made a career out of suing over vaccines, posted on X: “For those losing their minds over this, insurance will still cover them, and anyone can still inject their children with them.”
Technically true. But you can only get them if your doctor’s office stocks them. And they’ll only stock them if there’s demand. And demand just took a massive hit because the federal government essentially said, “Eh, these ones are optional.”
When the CDC signals that a vaccine isn’t important enough to recommend for everyone, do we really think uptake won’t drop? Do we think access won’t shrink? This isn’t true freedom of choice.
4. Is ACIP officially dead?
Someone in one of my Signal chats asked this, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it.
ACIP in 2025 already had me popping Tums like Tic Tacs. But at least it still existed. At least there was a pretense of process— public meetings, evidence review, votes.
This announcement bypassed ACIP entirely. No vote. No public comment. No transparent review of evidence. The decision came from political appointees at HHS.
So have we just stopped pretending? Is ACIP now purely decorative? If the committee can be sidelined whenever leadership wants to make a political statement, what’s the point of having it at all?
5. “Gold standard science”— more like fool’s gold.
The Høeg-Kulldorff memo that supposedly justifies these changes talks a lot about the need for “gold standard” placebo-controlled randomized trials. They call for more research, better safety surveillance, filling knowledge gaps.
Sounds reasonable, right?
Except you can’t ethically run placebo-controlled trials on vaccines that are already known to work and are the standard of care. Withholding a proven vaccine from children in a control group violates the Declaration of Helsinki. This is a foundational principle of research ethics.
So when they say “we need gold standard science before we can trust this schedule,” what they’re really saying is “we’re going to set an impossible bar and then act like the vaccines failed to clear it.”
Meanwhile, the memo itself doesn’t provide gold standard evidence for any of its recommendations. It’s largely a comparison of vaccine schedules across countries, with no rigorous analysis of why those differences exist or what outcomes they produce. No new data. Just vibes.
We’ve completely overhauled the U.S. vaccine schedule based on the fact that Denmark gives fewer shots. That’s it? That’s the gold standard science?
6. We have a very selective admiration for Denmark.
I’m still waiting for someone to explain why Denmark, a country with universal healthcare, near-universal prenatal screening, 46 weeks of paid parental leave, and a population smaller than Wisconsin, is a valid comparison for the United States. The memo doesn’t say.
The administration loves pointing to Denmark’s leaner vaccine schedule. Fewer shots! More freedom! But they seem less interested in copying Denmark’s universal healthcare system, its paid parental leave, its near-universal prenatal screening, or its robust disease surveillance programs that allow them to catch infections that vaccines might miss.
You can’t cherry-pick one policy from a country with a completely different infrastructure and expect the same outcomes. Denmark’s schedule works for Denmark because of everything underneath it.
If we’re going to cosplay as a Nordic country, let’s go all in. Universal healthcare, free college, robust social safety net—the whole thing. Oprah-style. YOU get universal healthcare! And YOU get paid parental leave! And YOU get a functioning social safety net!
Otherwise, stop pretending this is about “aligning with peer nations.” It’s about dismantling public health under the guise of international benchmarking.
7. The media coverage has been... surprisingly tame.
Some of the headlines I’ve seen: “CDC updates childhood vaccine schedule.” “HHS pares down recommended immunizations.”
Pares down? Updates?
This wasn’t an update. This was a unilateral overhaul, made without expert input, announced five days into the new year, justified by a memo that wouldn’t pass peer review, and modeled after the vaccine schedule of a country that looks nothing like ours.
A lot of these headlines fail to capture the gravity of what actually happened.
8. A lot of us are ready to help, but we need to get organized.
You know what happens when you put a bunch of passionate, empathetic, Type-A science and medical do-gooders who want to protect kids in a room together?
A lot of overlapping Google Docs, fifteen competing Signal channels, and at least three accidentally scheduled Zoom calls at the same time.
We’re trying. Organizations (including my own) are mobilizing. But we’re playing defense against a wrecking ball, and it’s hard to build faster than they can tear down. (Oh, and P.S., most of us are doing this without sustainable funding or infrastructure. For our next trick…)
Final thought:
The science on these vaccines hasn’t changed. The politics has.
Your pediatrician can still recommend these vaccines. The AAP schedule remains unchanged— and shoutout to the American Academy of Pediatrics for standing firm on their evidence-based recommendations. My kids will continue to follow the AAP schedule, and I'd encourage other parents to do the same.
Insurance should still cover them, at least through 2026.
But the signal has been sent. And signals matter.
I don’t know what comes next. None of us do. But I do know that a lot of very smart, very determined people are not going to let this stand without a fight.
Stay Curious,
Unbiased Science
America belongs to the people, not the politicians and their hacks. We need to take our country back!
Thank-you for all you are doing to bring actual science to the table against this madness.