WASHINGTON — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Health and Human Services, has criticized laws that give companies that make vaccines protection from lawsuits. If he takes office, he will have broad power to strip those protections, experts told STAT.
Most routine vaccines have been protected from lawsuits for nearly four decades, and vaccines developed to deal with emergencies have enjoyed protection for two decades. For the most part, the programs have been uncontroversial.
But that all came to an end during the Covid-19 pandemic, when programs meant to compensate people with serious side effects from vaccines were stretched. distrust in science increased and routine policy decisions regarding vaccines became highly politicized.
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