RFK Jr. cuts $500 million for mRNA vaccine projects, says no new contracts will be issued

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced that HHS is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development contracts and moving away from the technology in favor of ‘safer’ alternatives.

The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) has announced it is “winding down” almost $500 million worth of mRNA vaccine projects and rejecting future exploration of the technology in favor of more conventional vaccines, in perhaps the biggest delivery yet of what his supporters hoped for when President Donald Trump appointed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head the department.

“We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted,” Kennedy said in a Tuesday press release. “BARDA [the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority] is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development investments because the data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu. We’re shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate.”

“Let me be absolutely clear: HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them. That’s why we’re moving beyond the limitations of mRNA and investing in better solutions,” Kennedy added.

We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted. BARDA is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development investments because the data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu. We’re shifting that funding toward… pic.twitter.com/GPKbuU7ywN

— Secretary Kennedy (@SecKennedy) August 5, 2025

Some projects will be canceled outright, while others will be modified to shift focus away from mRNA and toward other work. “While some final-stage contracts (e.g., Arcturus and Amplitude) will be allowed to run their course to preserve prior taxpayer investment, no new mRNA-based projects will be initiated,” HHS explains.

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a doctor who voted to confirm Kennedy after receiving assurance he was less opposed to conventional vaccines than his history suggested, said the move has “conceded to China an important technology needed to combat cancer and infectious disease,” and “works against” President Trump’s goals to “Make America Healthy Again and Make America Great Again.”

READ: mRNA vaccines linked to genetic changes that can cause cancer, autoimmune disorders

When asked about HHS’s decision the next day, Trump said “we’re going to look at that” before declaring that his first administration’s Operation Warp Speed initiative, under which the COVID-19 shots were developed in record time, was “considered one of the most incredible things ever done in this country,” but suggested now the focus was on other solutions for other diseases. “We are speaking about it, we have meetings about it tomorrow … and we’ll determine,” the president said.

Whether or not mRNA research will resume in the future under more rigorous standards, the technology has drawn controversy due to its use by the most prominent COVID-19 shots, which were developed in record time by the first Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed initiative.

The federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reports 38,709 deaths, 221,030 hospitalizations, 22,331 heart attacks, and 28,966 myocarditis and pericarditis cases as of June 27, among other ailments. U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) researchers have recognized a “high verification rate of reports of myocarditis to VAERS after mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccination,” leading to the conclusion that “under-reporting is more likely” than over-reporting.

In May, U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner Marty Makary and vaccine chief Dr. Vinay Prasad announced that there would no longer be blanket recommendations for all Americans to receive the shot, but the “risk factors” it would still be recommended for include asthma, cancer, cerebrovascular disease, chronic kidney diseases, a handful of chronic liver and lung diseases, diabetes, disabilities such as Down’s syndrome, heart conditions, HIV, dementia, Parkinson’s, obesity, smoking, tuberculosis, and more. Kennedy Jr. subsequently announced COVID shots would not be recommended to healthy children or pregnant women.

However, in June, the Trump administration approved a new mRNA-based COVID-19 shot from Moderna, for “individuals who have been previously vaccinated with any COVID-19 vaccine and are: 65 years and older, or 12 through 64 with at least one underlying condition that puts them at high risk for severe outcomes from COVID-19.”

Related Topics:#CalvinFreiburger #LifeSiteNews #mRNAVaccines #RFKJr 22mRNAVaccineContractsCancelled BARDA mRNAVaccineProjectFundingCancelled

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Addictions

The War on Commonsense Nicotine Regulation

Published on November 8, 2025

Todayville

From the Brownstone Institute

Roger Bate

Cigarettes kill nearly half a million Americans each year. Everyone knows it, including the Food and Drug Administration. Yet while the most lethal nicotine product remains on sale in every gas station, the FDA continues to block or delay far safer alternatives.

Nicotine pouches—small, smokeless packets tucked under the lip—deliver nicotine without burning tobacco. They eliminate the tar, carbon monoxide, and carcinogens that make cigarettes so deadly. The logic of harm reduction couldn’t be clearer: if smokers can get nicotine without smoke, millions of lives could be saved.

Sweden has already proven the point. Through widespread use of snus and nicotine pouches, the country has cut daily smoking to about 5 percent, the lowest rate in Europe. Lung-cancer deaths are less than half the continental average. This “Swedish Experience” shows that when adults are given safer options, they switch voluntarily—no prohibition required.

In the United States, however, the FDA’s tobacco division has turned this logic on its head. Since Congress gave it sweeping authority in 2009, the agency has demanded that every new product undergo a Premarket Tobacco Product Application, or PMTA, proving it is “appropriate for the protection of public health.” That sounds reasonable until you see how the process works.

Manufacturers must spend millions on speculative modeling about how their products might affect every segment of society—smokers, nonsmokers, youth, and future generations—before they can even reach the market. Unsurprisingly, almost all PMTAs have been denied or shelved. Reduced-risk products sit in limbo while Marlboros and Newports remain untouched.

Only this January did the agency relent slightly, authorizing 20 ZYN nicotine-pouch products made by Swedish Match, now owned by Philip Morris. The FDA admitted the obvious: “The data show that these specific products are appropriate for the protection of public health.” The toxic-chemical levels were far lower than in cigarettes, and adult smokers were more likely to switch than teens were to start.

The decision should have been a turning point. Instead, it exposed the double standard. Other pouch makers—especially smaller firms from Sweden and the US, such as NOAT—remain locked out of the legal market even when their products meet the same technical standards.

The FDA’s inaction has created a black market dominated by unregulated imports, many from China. According to my own research, roughly 85 percent of pouches now sold in convenience stores are technically illegal.

The agency claims that this heavy-handed approach protects kids. But youth pouch use in the US remains very low—about 1.5 percent of high-school students according to the latest National Youth Tobacco Survey—while nearly 30 million American adults still smoke. Denying safer products to millions of addicted adults because a tiny fraction of teens might experiment is the opposite of public-health logic.

There’s a better path. The FDA should base its decisions on science, not fear. If a product dramatically reduces exposure to harmful chemicals, meets strict packaging and marketing standards, and enforces Tobacco 21 age verification, it should be allowed on the market. Population-level effects can be monitored afterward through real-world data on switching and youth use. That’s how drug and vaccine regulation already works.

Sweden’s evidence shows the results of a pragmatic approach: a near-smoke-free society achieved through consumer choice, not coercion. The FDA’s own approval of ZYN proves that such products can meet its legal standard for protecting public health. The next step is consistency—apply the same rules to everyone.

Combustion, not nicotine, is the killer. Until the FDA acts on that simple truth, it will keep protecting the cigarette industry it was supposed to regulate.

Author

Roger Bate

Roger Bate is a Brownstone Fellow, Senior Fellow at the International Center for Law and Economics (Jan 2023-present), Board member of Africa Fighting Malaria (September 2000-present), and Fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs (January 2000-present).

Health

RFK Jr. urges global health authorities to remove mercury from all vaccines

Published on November 7, 2025

Todayville

From LifeSiteNews

By Charles Richards

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is urging health leaders across the planet to stop including mercury in vaccinations.

“Now that America has removed mercury from all vaccines, I call on every global health authority to do the same — to ensure that no child, anywhere in the world, is ever exposed to this deadly neurotoxin again,” he said.

Kennedy’s comments came in a video he recorded for the Minamata Convention on Mercury. The event is an international gathering aimed at preventing human contact with mercury, which, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), is one of the top 10 chemicals of major public health concern. The treaty, backed by the United Nations (UN), was first signed in 2013 by over 140 countries.

Kennedy noted that while the group’s goal is no doubt praiseworthy, it has not gone far enough in its efforts.

“Article 4 of the convention calls on parties to cut mercury use by phasing out listed, mercury-added products. But in 2010, as the treaty took shape, negotiators made a major exception. Thimerosal-containing vaccines were carved out of the regulation,” he recalled.

“The same treaty that began to phase out mercury in lamps and cosmetics chose to leave it in products injected into babies, pregnant women, and the most vulnerable among us,” he noted. “We have to ask: Why? Why do we hold a double standard for mercury? Why call it dangerous in batteries, in over-the-counter medications, and make-up but acceptable in vaccines and dental fillings?”

This past summer, Kennedy’s Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices launched a study to research the vaccine schedule for children. Among other recommendations, the committee advised the removal of thimerosal, a neurotoxic, mercury-containing preservative that had been used in flu shots.

Kennedy noted in his video message that “thimerosal’s own label requires it to be treated as a hazardous material and warns against ingestion,” adding that “there is not a single study that proves it’s safe. That’s why in July of this year the United States closed the final chapter on the use of thimerosal as a vaccine preservative, something that should have happened years ago.”

“Manufacturers have confirmed that they can produce mercury-free, single dose vaccines without interrupting supply. There is no excuse for inaction or holding stubbornly to the status quo,” he exclaimed. “Now that America has removed mercury from all vaccines, I call on every global health authority and every party to this convention to do the same.”

“Let’s honor and protect humanity, and our children, and creation from mercury,” he concluded.

The Minamata Convention on Mercury went into effect in August 2017. It was initially approved by the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee in Geneva, Switzerland, in January 2013. It was adopted in October 2013 at a Diplomatic Conference in Kumamoto, Japan. Per its website, it is named “after the bay in Japan where, in the mid-20th century, mercury-tainted industrial wastewater poisoned thousands of people, leading to severe health damage that became known as the ‘Minamata disease.’”