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WV School Board President Says Courts Should Decide Immunization Conflict
West Virginia Board of Education President Paul Hardesty on Wednesday doubled down on the board’s prior guidance that public schools should continue to require students to adhere to the state’s strict vaccination requirements, despite Gov. Patrick Morrisey’s executive order and a Raleigh County court’s ruling upholding religious exemptions.
Hardesty said the board’s conflict with Morrisey’s order would be resolved in court, but the board stopped short of voting to appeal Judge Michael Froble’s ruling last month that three plaintiffs in a lawsuit be preliminarily allowed to attend class there with a religious exemption.
“We’re not going to comply with an executive order that’s in conflict with the 1937 law,” he said. “We can’t do that. We’ve been advised by our counsel not to do that. I don’t want you to think for a minute we’re trying to inconvenience the people of West Virginia. We’re just trying to do our job.”
Hardesty said he takes offense to Morrisey’s characterization of the board as unelected bureaucrats, a comment Morrisey made during a June press conference. Taking a jab at Morrisey, Hardesty called on schools in every county in the state to teach a unit on the three branches of government.
FDA Calls for Stronger Industry Collaboration on Infant and Child Food Recalls
Call to Action. In a letter dated July 9, 2025, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a clear call to action for manufacturers, distributors, and retailers of infant formula, baby food, and children’s food products.
The agency emphasized the urgent need for greater transparency and faster communication around food recalls, especially considering recent incidents involving chemical contaminants in products intended for te most vulnerable consumers — children.
FDA Regulation of Infant Formula. Infant formula is defined under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) as “a food which purports to be or is represented for special dietary use solely as a food for infants by reason of its simulation of human milk or its suitability as a complete or partial substitute for human milk” (FD&C Act § 201).
Schools Brace for MAHA Changes to Lunches
The Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement is taking aim at school lunches in a move advocates say is unrealistic without devoting more federal resources to K-12 students. While some schools can only afford to buy frozen meals that are heated up and served, the Trump administration is looking for freshly cooked meals that will take more employees and ingredients to put together.
The MAHA Commission was required to send over recommendations to the White House by Tuesday to combat childhood chronic diseases, a document experts and advocates are eagerly awaiting. But three people familiar with the matter told CNN the report will not be released immediately to the public, keeping schools on their toes as it is expected to impact their food.
“We’re guessing at this point what we think that the report is going to say around school nutrition, but we have a few hints. RFK Jr. has said that school lunch programs have deteriorated. He’s mentioned how many ultraprocessed foods are in school meals. He’s suggested that school meals are poisoning children. … I think we’re all pretty much anticipating something around that,” said Meghan Maroney, campaign manager for federal child nutrition programs at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
Wiles Intervened to Save RFK Jr.’s Top Vaccine Aide
White House chief of staff Susie Wiles was behind President Donald Trump’s highly unusual decision last week to rehire a vaccine regulator he’d just fired at the urging of MAGA influencer Laura Loomer.
Wiles’ intervention in getting Vinay Prasad’s job back, as described by two senior administration officials granted anonymity to discuss sensitive details, followed pleas from both Prasad’s boss, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary, and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. They insisted that Prasad is part of Kennedy’s broader Make America Healthy Again movement and integral to the Trump coalition.
“After Vinay left, Marty and Bobby worked very, very, very hard through Susie Wiles, the president’s chief of staff, to tell the president that Vinay was not anti-Trump,” one of the senior administration officials said. “The MAHA movement is an expansion of the MAGA, sort of, you know, big tent.”
Other Nations Move Toward Making Their Own Vaccines as US Cuts Funding
At least a dozen countries are interested in developing their own vaccines because they’re losing confidence that the US government will have immunizations ready for the next pandemic, a top biotech investor said.
Other nations have largely depended on the U.S. to make shots that are deployed globally. The COVID-19 vaccines, developed by Pfizer Inc. and Moderna Inc. and embraced by the U.S. government, were used by tens of millions of people around the world.
But under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the US government has ended contracts to make vaccines using new technology. And now, countries aren’t sure they can count on the U.S. in the next pandemic, said Noubar Afeyan, founder of Flagship Pioneering, which invests in and creates new biotech companies.
Flagship’s companies are seeing “a lot of interest overseas” from countries that want to learn how to design and make their own vaccines, he said.
