Kennedy Tries To Kill An Important Tool To Fight Covid

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When I get my covid shot each fall, I plan it out—I get it done on a Friday afternoon because about eighteen hours later I get achy, cold, tired, and generally not-good-for-much. This usually lasts about a day and then I’m fine. When I had covid, I felt that way too, but for two weeks and with a horrible cough. mRNA vaccines like the ones from Pfizer and Moderna are very “reactogenic”—they really fire up the immune system to create immunity to covid. There is another option, however.

Novavax makes a covid vaccine “the old fashioned way”. Instead of using mRNA to tell your cells to make spike protein, this shot uses the protein itself. It’s still effective (although it might not be quite as effective as the other shots) but it rarely causes the same reaction that as the mRNA vaccines. For the last two years it’s been my intention to get the Novavax but we have Pfizer in our office and convenience wins.

I talk to patients every day about vaccines, and for those who have avoided the mRNA shots because they feel crappy afterwards, I recommend the Novavax. But this important choice is now in danger of disappearing, not because of concerns over safety and efficacy but because of the delusional mind of Robert Kennedy and the horrible people he has brought into HHS.

When covid vaccines were introduced, they were approved under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). For the mRNA shots, this was eventually converted to full approval, as was to happen for Novavax this spring. But that never happened. Instead, the FDA is asking for more studies—big, expensive, redundant studies that will effectively kill the shot for this fall and winter’s respiratory virus season.

For context, Kennedy and the people he has brought into our public health system, including Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health, want to eliminate mRNA vaccines, as do many state legislatures. This would leave us without any way to prevent a disease that has killed at least 1.2 million Americans and was for a time one of the leading causes of death in the US.

Before it was granted emergency use authorization, Novavax completed a placebo-controlled trial with 30,000 subjects. This is an enormous study and it showed 90% efficacy without any significant safety problems. Kennedy’s attempt to kill this shot has nothing to do with safety or efficacy—he has stated over and over for the last couple of decades that he thinks vaccines are bad. And now he has the power to kill them for the rest of us.

With public health under unprecedented threats from every direction, it’s hard to know how to react. That’s the point. The enemies of public health know that if they flood the zone, the rest of us may just give up.

We cannot give up.

When Kennedy and Bhattacharya announced their intention to create a registry of autistic people in the US, people pushed back, and for now they’ve dropped their plan. Push-back works. Please, write or call your representatives when you hear about these things. You don’t have to do it every time a new horror emerges from these people, but every little bit helps. You don’t have to be a professional writer—just tell them how you feel and what they can do.¹

Science will never be immune from politics. It’s a very human endeavor, but one that aims to find the truth, or at least come close. But what is happening now is not just politics-as-usual. This is a multi-front attack on the most vital part of our health care and public health systems. But politicians care about getting re-elected. You have power, even as a single individual. Exercise it, or lose it.

Stay well,

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1  For example: “Dear _____, My name is _____ and I am worried about Robert Kennedy’s attacks on our health care system. Specifically, I just read that he is trying to block the Novavax vaccine, a shot that has been proven to be safe and effective. This shot is vital for people who don’t want to get mRNA shots, which he is also threatening to get rid of. Please help us preserve these necessary tools that help keep us healthy and alive. Sincerely, ____”