The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) vaccine advisory panel, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), now has a new charter detailing the group’s actions.
Under the new charter, the advisory panel will not commit to a specific number of meetings. It also adds several groups, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, the Independent Medical Alliance, the Medical Academy of Pediatrics and Special Needs, and Physicians for Informed Consent, as liaisons to the committee.
The charter lists several key duties of the ACIP:
- Vaccine use recommendations
- Immunization schedules
- Evidence review and recommendation framework
- Vaccine safety and other considerations
- Strategies for public health
- Considerations for special populations
- Childhood vaccines
Several groups criticized the new charter. “In this new charter, governance of the committee would be the responsibility of the CDC director instead of members with deep expertise on immunization, which would intensify politicization of the ACIP,” the Infectious Diseases Society of America, Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, and Society of Infectious Diseases Pharmacists said in a joint statement. “The new charter inappropriately emphasizes potential gaps or limitations in vaccine data, which could be used to delay, rescind or refuse to make evidence-based vaccine recommendations. Neither does the new charter commit to a schedule of meetings, which contradicts the past practice of having regularly scheduled meetings open to the public. It also noticeably softens requirements regarding the publication of vaccine recommendations and their use for informing insurance coverage. Transparency in vaccine decision-making is essential to restoring public trust in health care.”
