Brian Laird on WNYC, and yes, on Tuesdays on the show, we like to bring the science on health and climate and sometimes other science policy issues.

Today we return to the issue of vaccines with one of America's leading vaccine scientists.

As the vaccine news continues to pile up, even as the public is mostly being focused on the war,

we don't want to get distracted from everything else.

As we speak, in the first two months of this year alone, the U.S. reported

1,100 cases of measles six times more than has been typical for an entire year since

measles was declared eliminated in this country. This outbreak unfolds against a backdrop

of sweeping changes, as you know,

to how the federal government talks about, recommends and regulates vaccines. The CDC's advisory

committee on immunization practices was overhauled. The childhood vaccine schedule has been cut,

and the chair of that committee under RFK has even suggested that

the polio vaccine should be optional. Earlier this month, the FDA also reversed course on

reviewing a new flu vaccine that trials showed was significantly more effective than what we

currently have. They then, under public pressure, reverse themselves again, and now they will at least review it.

And some breaking news is that the Trump administration has apparently convinced an international

panel to wait until after the midterm elections to declare if the U.S. loses its measles elimination status.

So with me on as much of this as we could get to is Dr. Paul Offutt,

director of the Vaccine Education Center and an attending physician in infectious diseases

at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia. He's the author of

Autism's False Profits. And most recently, tell me when it's over, an insider's guide to

deciphering COVID myths and navigating our post-pandemic world. He's also one of those

ASIP vaccine advisory board members who was fired last spring. Dr. Alford, always good

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