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Connecticut Pediatricians Fight Anti-Vaccine Push Targeting Education Funds
Anti-vaccine advocates have called on the Trump administration to cut education funds for states that don’t offer vaccine exemptions. Connecticut pediatricians and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) pushed back at a news briefing at the Community Health Center in Hartford on Tuesday. Blumenthal said that the federal government shouldn’t penalize states like Connecticut that don’t allow religious exemptions from childhood vaccinations.
“Listen to the science, we know vaccines work. Reject the proposals to withhold funding from states like Connecticut that have high vaccination rates, 92.8% proudly,” he said.
Vaccinations keep kids out of the hospital, said Dr. Ian Michelow, head of pediatric infectious disease and immunology at Hartford’s Connecticut Children’s Hospital.
“We do not want these children to be admitted in the first place,” he said. “And to get the severe complications that linger for a long time and sometimes cause permanent damage. And be serious enough to land children in the ICU, and sometimes death,” Michelow said.
President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to defund schools with COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Advocates linked to Children’s Health Defense, founded by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., want to extend that to schools in states without religious vaccination exemptions.
MAHA Leaders May Take Aim at Pharma DTC Advertising
A report from the Make America Healthy Again Commission (MAHA) was postponed earlier this month, but nestled within leaked documents is a strategy that reveals more about health leaders’ goals, including potential new oversight of pharma’s direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising practices.
DTC advertising has long been a target of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary and MAHA monarch Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Congress has taken some interest in passing a ban on those ads, but real reform has yet to arrive. In the upcoming report, health leaders may seek to crack down on DTC ads, particularly on social media where telehealth companies use “deceptive” marketing tactics, according to draft strategy documents published by Politico.
The leaked draft strategy contains policy recommendations from a group assembled by President Trump and Kennedy, and its objectives could change before the official version is published. The White House stated it delayed the report’s release to coordinate the schedules of officials involved in creating it, Politico reported.
Draft MAHA Report Favors Research, Not Rules
The strategy for ending childhood chronic disease in the U.S. will emphasize research, public education, and voluntary action, rather than new regulatory measures, according to a draft report from the Make America Healthy Again Commission.
The New York Times first obtained the draft of the Strategy report, which has not been confirmed by the White House and will go through revisions before finalization. It was initially expected to be publicly released on Aug. 12, 2025, the date of the deadline for submission to the President. But the White House delayed publication, citing the need to coordinate officials’ schedules.
The new Strategy from the Commission — chaired by the U.S. Department of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — will build on the Commission’s first publication, an Assessment released in May. The Assessment identified four main drivers of childhood chronic disease: poor diet, chemical exposure, lack of physical activity and chronic stress, and overmedicalization.
On issues such as poor diets and pesticides, the draft expands on the original report, emphasizing additional research, improved public education, and voluntary industry action. But it offers few new recommended restrictions. “This report has one overriding implied message,” Marion Nestle says of the draft. “More research needed.”
Pesticides Test MAHA-MAGA Alliance
The “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) movement could be on a collision course with its Republican allies over pesticides and toxic chemicals.
MAHA is strongly aligned with the Trump administration, having cheered its anti-vaccine actions and food safety reforms. In general, the movement has been deeply skeptical of Big Pharma, Big Agriculture and Big Chemical. And cracks are beginning to form.
MAHA-aligned groups and influencers are particularly raising alarms about provisions in a House appropriations bill that they say will shield pesticide and chemical manufacturers from accountability — and ultimately make Americans less healthy.
Meanwhile, a draft of the administration’s “MAHA report” reportedly omits any calls to prevent pesticide exposure, also disappointing advocates.
