LARA just issued the same presser under the subject line, "Sharing on behalf of MDHHS."

No other comment, but an early signal to every licensed health professional in Michigan that compliance is expected.

Also Friday, the CDC's recommendation changed.

My favorite part: "shared clinical decision-making." ❤️ 🥂 

Close second: MedPage again referencing "pregnant women." 😊 

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19vaccine/117567

CDC Panel Stops Endorsing COVID Shots, Pushes for 'Choice'

— RFK Jr.'s committee breaks from flu shot model, leaves it up to individuals to decide

by Terrence Rudd, Staff Writer, MedPage Today
September 19, 2025 

The CDC's vaccine advisory committee is no longer recommending the COVID-19 shot for specific groups of Americans, but instead stressing shared clinical decision-making in its newest recommendations.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) on Friday unanimously voted 12-0 to update its recommendations for pediatric and adult immunization schedules, but it deviated from recent FDA vaccine approval language by simply calling for "individual-based decision-making" in everyone ages 6 months and older.

For those 6 months to 64 years, this was paired with recommended language that added "an emphasis that the risk-benefit of vaccination is most favorable for individuals who are at an increased risk for severe COVID-19 disease and lowest for individuals who are not at an increased risk, according to the CDC list of COVID-19 risk factors."

Until now, the vaccinations had been recommended as a routine step in the fall for nearly all Americans who wanted them -- just like a yearly flu vaccine.

Not everything earned unanimous support during the meeting. A motion to recommend that prescriptions be required to get a COVID vaccine led to a deadlocked 6-6 vote, with ACIP Chair Martin Kulldorff, PhD, formerly of Harvard Medical School in Boston, using his tie-breaking power to kill the proposal.

Panelists worried that the prescription proposal could cut pharmacists -- who administer more than 90% of all COVID shots but can't write prescriptions under Medicare Part B rules -- from the ranks of vaccination providers. The effects could slash access and clog primary care providers' offices, some members cautioned.

A third motion to strengthen discussions with patients about COVID vaccination risks and benefits also earned unanimous 12-0 approval. That recommendation calls for discussion of known risk factors for severe COVID outcomes, including age, prior infections, immunosuppression, and other comorbidities identified by the CDC, as well as "a discussion of the potential benefits and risks of vaccination and related uncertainties, especially those outlined in the vaccine information statement, as part of informed consent."

A fourth recommendation encouraged the CDC to promote more consistent, comprehensive informed consent processes, and to encourage the addition of descriptions of six risks and uncertainties outlined by ACIP member and COVID-19 working group chair Retsef Levi, PhD, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management in Boston. That motion passed on an 11-1 vote.

Kulldorff emphasized that the vaccination schedule recommendations won't affect vaccine access in the Vaccines for Children Program -- the federally run program that covers vaccines for about half of children in the U.S.

Sean O'Leary, MD, of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), said the panel's daylong debate involved clear efforts to "sow distrust" about vaccines and would have "real-time impacts on American children."

But he expressed relief that people could instead follow guidelines from his and other medical groups that still recommend the vaccines be available, like in prior years.

"It was a very, very strange meeting," O'Leary said.

A Festivus of Vaccine Uncertainties

In June, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sacked the 17 former members of ACIP and replaced them with members more aligned with his views. During the meeting, new members put plenty of focus on COVID vaccines' perceived unknown risks and uncertain benefits.

The discussion featured contentious topics including alleged DNA alterations by mRNA vaccines and case reports of myocarditis in vaccinated people, assertions that mRNA vaccines don't work as intended, the existence of a post-vaccination syndrome, and potential connections between the vaccines and conditions such as birth defects and cancer.

In a presentation to the panel, CDC COVID-19 workgroup member Henry Bernstein, DO, of the Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell in New York, delivered a stinging dissent to the panel's skeptical tone. The former ACIP member called for continued vaccination coverage for a wide range of populations, including pregnant women, children younger than 2 years, older adults, "and anyone who feels they want protection for themselves and their families."

"If we don't want to say vaccines are 'safe and effective,' well, they work!" Bernstein said.

ACIP, FDA, and Medical Organizations Sing Separate Tunes

Last month, the FDA approved updated COVID vaccines for the 2025-2026 respiratory virus season for all adults 65 and older, but limited their use in younger people and children to those with at least one condition that puts them at high risk for severe disease. Kennedy also announced in May that the CDC had dropped its recommendationopens in a new tab or window that healthy children and pregnant women get routine COVID shots.

Those moves prompted multiple medical organizations to issue their own vaccination recommendations, including the AAP, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), and the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM). The AAP and AAFP said that all children ages 6 to 23 months should be vaccinated against COVID. ACOG, SMFM, and AAFP also recommended that women who are pregnant at any stage or lactating should get a COVID shot.

Health insurer industry group AHIP released a statement Tuesday that backs ACIP's older, broader COVID vaccination recommendations. "Health plans will continue to cover all ACIP-recommended immunizations that were recommended as of September 1, 2025, including updated formulations of the COVID-19 and influenza vaccines, with no cost-sharing for patients through the end of 2026," AHIP said.

On Friday, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) again called for Kennedy to resign.

"His leadership has already put up barriers to many Americans' choice to receive the COVID vaccine," said IDSA President Tina Tan, MD, in a statement. "Now he is attacking routine childhood vaccines that have been given broadly and safely for decades, creating chaos and confusion, taking away parents' choices and putting children's lives at significant risk for severe vaccine-preventable diseases."

Typically, ACIP recommendations must be approved by the CDC director, and are not considered final until they are published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.