Hello and welcome to the Osterholm Update, a podcast on COVID-19 and other infectious diseases with Dr. Michael Osterholm.

Dr. Osterholm is an internationally recognized medical detective and director of the Center for Infectious

Disease Research and Policy, or CIDRAP, at the University of Minnesota.

In this podcast, Dr. O. Strom draws on nearly 50 years of experience investigating infectious

disease outbreaks to provide straight talk on the latest infectious disease and public health

threats.

I'm Chris Dahl, reporter for CidRArap News, and I'm your host for these conversations.

Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of the Osterholm Update podcast.

We've had a heavy focus on vaccines in recent episodes, and with good reason.

In our last two episodes, we've discussed the changes

made to a CDC website page on vaccines and autism, and the recent decision by Health and Human

Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s hand-picked advisory committee on immunization

practices to limit the use of the hepatitis B vaccine in newborns. But if you thought the Trump administration and Kennedy were done taking a sledgehammer

to the U.S. vaccine infrastructure, the unfortunate reality is that they might just be getting

started.

Shortly after the ACIP meeting ended on December 5th, President Trump sent a memo to Kennedy

and the acting director of the CDC to review the

childhood vaccine schedule and consider recommending fewer shots to align with what other developed

countries do.

Then, last week, an HHS official told the New York Times that the Food and Drug Administration

was expanding its review of deaths potentially linked to COVID vaccines.

This broad assault on vaccine access, as Dr. Ostrom has called it, is among the many topics we'll be covering on this

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