To say the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is in a state of turmoil right now is to grossly understate the situation. The same political activist employees who determined that a cloth mask could stop a virus and that a million people engaging in rioting was not an infection risk are fighting Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.'s agenda every step of the way.
The latest battle, which resulted in the firing of CDC Director Monarez after a mere 30 days in office and a low-level mutiny by CDC staffers, is setting up a battle royal over what seems to be a totally unnecessary infant vaccine with billions of dollars at stake.
RELATED:
Report: CDC Director Out After 1 Month on the Job, Along With Several Other Resignations – RedState
Secretary Kennedy's skepticism about the current childhood vaccination schedule is pretty well known. In February 2025, Kennedy announced an investigation into the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule under the aegis of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. This was followed by Kennedy overhauling that committee to increase the range of opinions on childhood vaccines. As he was doing that, Kennedy directed that the COVID vaccine be removed from the childhood vaccination schedule.
RELATED:
'Clean Sweep': RFK Jr. Sends Entire 17-Member CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee Packing – RedState
MAHA: RFK Jr. Makes Good on COVID Vaccine Promise – RedState
On the whole, I think Kennedy has a strong point. Though each of the childhood vaccines may be safe and effective, we have no idea what the collective impact of about 20 vaccines does on a very immature immune system in the first six months.
You and the eight former CDC directors oversaw the massive decline in childhood health from under 10% of American children having a chronic disease in the 1980s to over 40% today. You and your kin have no legitimacy to lecture anybody about health policy. https://t.co/GuNUNT2NEr pic.twitter.com/N2nJI5t2JO
— Aaron Siri (@AaronSiriSG) September 1, 2025
The lines were drawn in Sunday's episode of ABC's This Week when Martha Raddatz interviewed Dr. Demetre Daskalakis.
Dr. Demetre Daskalakis Fears RFK Jr May Change the Hepatitis B Vaccine Recommendation for Newborns
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) August 31, 2025
“I predict that what they're going to do is try to change the birth dose of hepatitis B vaccine so that kids don't get it when they're born … We have one bite at that apple.” pic.twitter.com/PI7u9qTAyF
DASKALAKIS: I mean, from my vantage point as a doctor who’s taken the Hippocratic oath, I only see harm coming. I may be wrong. But based on what I'm seeing, based on what I've heard with the new members of the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices, or ACIP, they’re really moving in an ideologic direction where they want to see the undoing of vaccination. They do want to see the undoing of mRNA vaccination. They have a very specific target on COVID. But I do fear that they have other things that they are going to be working on.
Hepatitis B vaccine is on the agenda for the meeting on -- in September. I predict that what they’re going to do is try to change the birth dose of Hepatitis B vaccine so that kids don’t get it when they’re born. So, if you have a mother who is well-connected to care, you know her Hepatitis B status, that may not matter very much. But if you have a mother who’s not gone to prenatal care, who comes in to deliver, we have one bite at that apple so that child gets that important Hepatitis B vaccine.
Daskalakis was one of the three CDC officials who resigned in solidarity with former CDC Director Monarez. He was head of the CDC's Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. The choice of Daskalakis to raise concerns over the infant vaccine schedule was rather strange. He was Joe Biden's monkeypox czar who gained notoriety for refusing to discourage gay men from engaging in exotic sexual practices in response to the fake monkeypox threat. "One person's idea of risk," he opined, "Is another person's idea of a great festival or Friday night."
Biden monkeypox advisor Demetre Daskalakis says the Biden administration aims to "support peoples' joy as opposed to calling them 'risky'":
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) June 18, 2023
"One person's idea of risk is another person's idea of a great festival or Friday night." pic.twitter.com/nKsRQNmOwY
Remember when, during the Monkeypox outbreak, which the media tried to scare heterosexuals with (didn't work, we all knew the truth), there were cases of children and animals contracting it, and the media then become completely disinterested in what might really be going on.
— Cernovich (@Cernovich) August 31, 2025
His personal life is not that of one who gives credibility to an anti-STD campaign; see Infamous Biden-Era CDC Official Resigns, Immediately Shows He Should Have Been Fired Long Ago – RedState.
This is Demetre Daskalakis. This is not AI.
— NonnieQ✝️🍊🇺🇸 (@mommerlynn) August 29, 2025
He pushed vaccines and policy at the CDC (until a couple of days ago). 😳
How is this even possible that Satanist are in our government??? pic.twitter.com/OXxzKaOwnz
According to NIH, the prevalence rate of Hepatitis B among pregnant women is extraordinarily low. In Pregnancy and Viral Hepatitis - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf, it says, " A 0.7% to 0.9% prevalence of chronic HBV infection among pregnant women in the United States has been noted." That equates to about 17,000 babies per year, as of 2021. Keep in mind, this is in the context of about 3.7 million births per year. In short, even though about 3.68 million of the approximately 3.7 million babies born will not be at risk for hepatitis B, all of them will get it.
Daskalaskis tries to give the impression that if the mother didn't have prenatal care, then you don't know if she has hepatitis B, and vaccinating her newborn is her only chance to avoid infection. That isn't true. A dustup between Kentucky Senator Rand Paul and what appears to be Pharma's attack dog in the Senate, Louisiana's Bill Cassidy, demonstrates the argument.
Empirically, this is not true. Not all mothers have prenatal care. Some get infected between testing in the first trimester and delivery. In some cases, the test is overlooked. If a child is infected at birth, they have a 95% chance of becoming chronically infected UNLESS, they… https://t.co/uvQaucHWls
— U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (@SenBillCassidy) August 31, 2025
Standard of care is to test mothers for Hep. B at time of delivery, so anyone arguing for universal Hep. B vaccine at birth is simply schilling for Big Pharma. https://t.co/NXllXMbOJQ https://t.co/AacV95iUHO
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) September 1, 2025
PAUL: No medical reason to give newborns Hep B vaccine if mother is not infected. All mothers who deliver in a hospital are tested. This “scientist’s” fetish for vaccines not supported by the data
CASSIDY: Empirically, this is not true. Not all mothers have prenatal care. Some get infected between testing in the first trimester and delivery. In some cases, the test is overlooked. If a child is infected at birth, they have a 95% chance of becoming chronically infected UNLESS, they get one dose of hepatitis B vaccine. If they do, they have less than a 5% chance of being chronically infected.
PAUL: Standard of care is to test mothers for Hep. B at time of delivery, so anyone arguing for universal Hep. B vaccine at birth is simply schilling for Big Pharma. https://hhs.nd.gov/perinatal-hepatitis-b-factsheet
And Paul is correct. According to HHS guidelines, if the mother doesn't have a history of prenatal care, and most hepatitis B-positive women won't, then:
Hepatitis B testing should be done at the time of admission to the hospital for delivery for women who:
- Were not tested earlier in pregnancy
- Participated in injection drug use
- Had more than one sex partner in the previous six months
- Had a hepatitis B-positive sex partner
- Had an evaluation or treatment for a sexually transmitted diseases
- Have clinical hepatitis (symptoms or blood results that indicate liver damage)
According to the government's own standards, it is known before a woman gives birth whether she is infected.
There is a great case to be made that the DEI principle of Equity is involved here. We don't want to embarrass an expectant mother over her drug addiction and lack of prenatal care, because that would imply, for some reason, that she might not be a great mom. So what we do is give every baby the vaccine to make her feel normal.
And, of course, we can't forget the Almighty Greenback (this is slang for the dollar, not for an illegal from Greenland). It is sort of hard to pin down the cost for the hepatitis B vaccine. This is a Grok-generated response, but I have verified its source and provided links.
The cost of a single dose of the hepatitis B infant vaccine varies depending on location, healthcare system, and whether it's purchased through public or private channels. Based on available data:
- Private Sector (U.S.): A single dose of the hepatitis B vaccine for infants (e.g., Engerix-B or Recombivax HB) typically costs $40 to $110 without insurance.
- Public Sector (U.S.): Through CDC contracts for programs like Vaccines for Children (VFC), the cost per dose is lower, around $13 to $25, but these prices are not directly available to private providers or individuals.
I couldn't find average insurance costs, but if we split the difference between the highest public sector cost and the lowest non-insured cost, we come up with about $30. The current CDC recommendation is that infants receive three hepatitis B vaccinations at birth, two months, and six months. That comes to $90 per child. The effect of making that vaccination mandatory means that the $1.5 million price for vaccinating children at risk of infection balloons to $333 million.
You can be in favor of vaccines, and I'll match my military shot record with anyone's, and still not be convinced that vaccinating kids for diseases they are unlikely to encounter is a good idea. You can also have doubts about the rationality of bombarding a child's immune system with a wide array of vaccines being good medicine. The very fact that so many people are screaming so loudly about Kennedy's move on childhood vaccines indicates to me that the pain being felt is in their pocketbook and not by patients.
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