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NIH Director: mRNA Vaccine Contracts Were Canceled Because Public Lacks Trust in Technology
The head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has offered a new explanation for why the federal government canceled $500 million in contracts to help develop messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines, saying the platform is not viable because the public doesn’t trust it.
The agency’s director, Jay Bhattacharya, made the statement during an appearance on right-wing provocateur Steve Bannon’s podcast, “War Room,” that aired on Saturday. His rationale for the cancellation of the contracts does not align with the explanation offered last week by his boss, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who said vaccines made using this platform were not effective and were unsafe.
The NIH director, who came to national prominence during the pandemic as a co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration — a policy statement urging the U.S. government to lift COVID-19 containment measures — said the declining uptake of COVID-19 boosters signals that the public isn’t willing to be immunized with mRNA-based vaccines.
New ‘Make America Healthy Again’ Report to Be Released in Weeks
Americans will have to wait several weeks for the Trump administration’s next steps in its agenda to “Make America Healthy Again,” according to three people familiar with the matter.
While President Donald Trump’s MAHA Commission will submit its strategy to the White House on Tuesday — sticking to an executive-ordered deadline — scheduling issues stand in the way of its public release.
The commission is “on track” to deliver its report to the White House by Aug. 12, White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement. “The report will be unveiled to the public shortly thereafter as we coordinate the schedules of the President and the various cabinet members who are a part of the Commission.”
Officials are aiming to launch their strategy by the end of this month, according to the three people familiar.
The commission’s first MAHA report, issued in May, laid out the case that ultraprocessed foods, pharmaceutical prescriptions and environmental toxins are driving a crisis of childhood chronic disease in America. Much of the reports’ findings echoed longtime arguments of health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who leads the commission.
RFK Jr. Reveals ‘Wholesome Meal’ Plan for $4 Cheaper Than Big Mac
The Trump administration is in talks to boost the rollout of a “very wholesome meal for under $5” to underserved areas, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said.
Newsweek reached out to the Department of Health & Human Services via email for comment.
During his time in the Trump administration, Kennedy has made combating ultra-processed foods a centerpiece of his public health agenda. Labeling these foods as “poison,” Kennedy has repeatedly emphasized their central role in America’s chronic disease epidemic, especially among vulnerable populations.
Access to affordable, healthy food remains a critical challenge in many underserved communities, often called “food deserts.” These areas face higher rates of diet-related illnesses like diabetes, putting strain on individuals and public health systems. Kennedy has said healthier U.S. diets are key to his vision to “Make America Healthy Again.”
Kennedy outlined a new public health initiative on Monday, promising a shift away from corporate profit motives toward genuine health improvements, especially in underserved communities.
“We’re going to launch a new rubric where we, the public health agencies, actually do public health rather than promoting the profit taking by private corporations. And there’s some parts though in some underserved communities, there are food deserts where people don’t have access to some of these foods. And if they do, sometimes it’s too expensive,” Kennedy told Scripps News.
The Think Tank Making America Healthy Again
The American Conservative reported:
The Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement has been putting points on the board. Companies from Hershey’s to Starbucks are pledging to clean up their ingredients lists.
U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has dealt blows to the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices and the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. In less than two years, the acronym MAHA has gone from a niche slogan to a byword for anti-corporatism that even the New York Times can’t ignore.
But in order for the movement to keep momentum, it must adapt. Enter the MAHA Institute, Washington’s newest think tank. Co-presidents Mark Gorton and Tony Lyons (whom you may know from their associations with LimeWire and Skyhorse Publishing, respectively) announced the opening of the institute in May.
Since then, it has done many typical think tank-y things — hosted roundtables, put out press releases — but the result has been unique: Who expected the Heritage Foundation to cosponsor an event headlined by the home birth guru Stuart Fischbein?
HHS Freezes Vaxart’s Oral COVID-19 Vaccine, Again
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has slapped vaccine manufacturer Vaxart with another stop order for its next-generation oral COVID-19 vaccine, which the California-based company was developing with support from the federal government.
According to an SEC document on Aug. 5, Vaxart was told to stop screening and enrolling patients into a Phase IIb trial for VXA-CoV2-3.3, an investigational pill designed to elicit broad protection against variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Vaxart can “continue efforts associated with the per protocol follow-up for the 10,000-person cohort, to the extent already dosed,” as per the regulatory filing. The biotech has so far enrolled around half of its target participants.
HHS did not give Vaxart a reason for the order, only indicating that it will release a “follow-up notice with further details,” according to the SEC document. Vaxart is working on the mid-stage trial with funding from the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), which gave the biotech an award of up to $460 million.
