Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., on Friday urged the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)'s acting director not to sign off on new guidance that would end routine hepatitis B (HBV) vaccinations for newborns, calling the proposed change "a mistake."
Cassidy made the comments after the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted in favor of the recommendation, finding parents should exercise "individual-based decision-making," in consultation with a doctor, when deciding whether to vaccinate their children for HBV.
For those not receiving the HBV birth dose, the ACIP suggested the initial dose not be administered before the child is 2 months old.
"As a liver doctor who has treated patients with hepatitis B for decades, this change to the vaccine schedule is a mistake," Cassidy wrote in an X post on Friday. "The hepatitis B vaccine is safe and effective. The birth dose is a recommendation, NOT a mandate."
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Cassidy added that before the birth dose was recommended, 20,000 newborns a year were infected with hepatitis B.
Now, he noted, it's fewer than 20.
"Ending the recommendation for newborns makes it more likely the number of cases will begin to increase again," Cassidy wrote. "This makes America sicker. Acting CDC Director O'Neill should not sign these new recommendations and instead retain the current, evidence-based approach."
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Cassidy, a physician, targeted Aaron Siri on Thursday, noting the attorney who worked for Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s presidential campaign and has filed petitions to halt certain vaccines "is a trial attorney who makes his living suing vaccine manufacturers."
"He is presenting as if an expert on childhood vaccines," Cassidy wrote in an X post. "The ACIP is totally discredited. They are not protecting children."
In August, Cassidy denounced an HHS decision to slash funding for mRNA vaccine development, claiming it undermined President Donald Trump's mission to make the nation healthy again.
Cassidy's office and the CDC did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's requests for comment.
