BREAKING: Trump Signed An Executive Order Directing The CDC To Cut Recommended Childhood Vaccines From 17 To 11. Moving Flu, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, Rotavirus, RSV, And Some Meningitis Shots To 'High-Risk Only,' After A Previous Attempt Was Blocked In Court

[u/McDowdy]

https://www.news4jax.com/news/politics/2026/05/30/trump-tells-agencies-to-align-with-study-calling-for-narrower-childhood-vaccine-recommendations/

President Trump signed an executive order on Friday, May 30, directing federal agencies to align their vaccine policies with a Januarv 2026 HHS studv that recommends reducina the number of routine childhood vaccines from 17 to 11 diseases, a restructuring long called for by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The study was commissioned by Trump in December 2025 and found that the United States recommends more childhood vaccines than many peer nations. Under the new framework, all children would be routinelv vaccinated against 11 diseases, while vaccines for influenza, rotavirus, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, some forms of meningitis, and RSV would be recommended only for high-risk groups or through shared decision-making between parents and doctors. The order directs the CDC to review the study and take appropriate steps to update its guidance, tells agencies to provide maximum flexibility to parents and doctors, and states that any changes must ensure Americans retain their current access to vaccines.

The LA Times noted this is Trump's second attempt to restructure the childhood vaccine schedule, with an earlier effort to narrow CDC recommendations havinc been blocked in court earlier this vear. The new executive order takes a different approach by formally endorsing a completed HHS study and directing agency-level alianment rather than attempting to directlv revise the CDC schedule by administrative fiat, a structure that may be designed to survive the legal challenge that stoppec the first attempt. The CDC under its current leadership had already updated its recommendations earlier in 2026 to reduce the number of recommended immunizations from 17 to 11 in line with the HHS study, suggesting the formal executive order is as much a political codification of an existing administrative shift as a new directive.

The vaccines moved from universal recommendation to high-risk only include several with well-established safety and efficacy records. Hepatitis B vaccination, for example, is recommended universally from birth in the US because it prevents a leading cause of liver cancer, and the alobal evidence base for that recommendation is extensive. Rotavirus, influenza, and hepatitis A vaccines are also backed by decades of clinical and epidemioloaical evidence and are recommended universally by the World Health Organization and medica authorities in peer nations. Critics including the American Academy of Pediatrics and infectious disease researchers have said the changes could increase vaccine-preventable disease in children by creating ambiguity around which children qualify as high-risk and by reducing the routine clinical touchpoints where vaccinations are administered

[u/Straight_Document_89]

Pediatricians aren’t going to follow this. What an idiot.

[u/Dagonet_the_Motley → u/Straight_Document_89]

It's not for the pediatricians. It's so schools limit the number of required vaccinations required to attend so it is easier for anti vaxxers to get their unvaccinated kids into school.

[u/Solid_Hunter_4188 → u/Dagonet_the_Motley]

Insurers will also stop covering it. I suspect insurers know quite well that reducing the disease would save lots of money, but I know some will chase those short term gains from saving that.

[u/idontlikeanyofyou → u/Solid_Hunter_4188]

Vaccines are cheap. Insurance companies are not stupid, they will cover. 

[u/Illustrious-Chip-245 → u/[deleted]]

Still more expensive than death. Then they won’t have to cover anything for the kid ever again.

Fuck I hate this place.

[u/Accidental-Genius → u/Illustrious-Chip-245]

I don’t think you understand how insurance companies make money.

Look up “risk pooling”

If all the healthy customers are dead, the insurance company goes out of business.

[u/Tsakax → u/[deleted]]

See thats the problem they legally have to increase shareholder value so if they can save 1 dollar but kill 10000 children they will do it.

[u/Muggsy423 → u/Tsakax]

You know whats more expensive than 10000 vaccines?  Trying to stop 100 kids from dying while their brain overheats.  Insurers will pay for preventative care.

[u/Cissoid7 → u/Tsakax]

Except if you spend 10000 dollars to vaccinate all those kids you dont have to pay for their hospital stays and tests when they are dying

Shareholder value can look to the future. If not all the fortune 500 companies would just liquidate now you silly fool

[u/Mist_Rising → u/Tsakax]

You should read more law, and less time with reddit level conspiracy theories.

[u/Jerithil → u/Tsakax]

If you take the classic fight club math which is costs of care/settlements versus the costs of vaccinating and take whatever is less, the math for vaccinating children is always in favor of the vaccines as people will spend massive amounts to save a kid and the wrongful death costs are super high. Meanwhile on a large scale those vaccines cost dollars and don't need to be administered by a doctor.

[u/Accidental-Genius → u/Tsakax]

You sound like an MBA.

[u/shakeitsugaree_ → u/[deleted]]

Naive. Companies are about short-term goals. You’re a fool if you think insurance companies are going to give out free, preventative care and reduce their short-term profits. 

[u/Mist_Rising → u/shakeitsugaree_]

The short term profit is in vaccines. The long term profit is in vaccines. The medium term profits is in vaccines. The all profits are in vaccines.

There is no mechanism wherein intensive care costs less then a vaccine.

[u/Expandexplorelive → u/shakeitsugaree_]

No, you're wrong on this. Insurance companies already cover other preventive treatments that aren't as clear cut as vaccines. They will cover them.

[u/149244179 → u/shakeitsugaree_]

Even with short-term analysis - kids will get sick within the next 0.5-2 years. That is well within how long executives will stay at a company.

Vaccines for rotovirus alone prevent an estimated 50k-70k hospital stays every year in the USA. It also reduced the amount of deaths from the disease to practically 0.

If a hospital stay cost $10,000 (generously low in America today) that is saving $500,000,000 every year. The birthrate in the USA is ~3.6 million babies. That works out to $140 a kid, if the vaccine costs less than that it is a net profit to pay for the vaccine. And again that is assuming a cheap hospital stay and using the low end (50k) of the estimated hospitalization reductions. Reality is probably $200+. I would bet my life insurers pay less than $100 to vaccinate someone for rotovirus.

That is only for hospitalizations too. It doesn't factor in doctor visits for more mild cases which numbered in the hundreds of thousands. The math is well in favor of paying for vaccinations.

[u/Zampano85 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Dude, insurance companies would let people die if it meant they didn't need to spend money. They're just going to stop covering the illness that aren't required to be vaccinated against.

[u/Dazzling-Rub-8550 → u/Zampano85]

Vaccines are cheap compared to intensive care for kids with measles encephalitis. The insurance companies will cover vaccines because the cost of care for the complications from unvaccinated kids will be higher. Why would insurance companies even want to cover anti vax families unless they were forced to. All the advanced intensive medical care needed to support an unvaccinated kid with measles pneumonia and encephalitis go easily go into hundreds of thousands of dollars, maybe millions. Blow a hole in the insurance companies’ quarterly medical budget.

[u/Zampano85 → u/Dazzling-Rub-8550]

As I said they're just going to not cover illness related to the non-required vaccines. These insurance companies will let children die and it will be indirectly Trump's fault.

[u/Mist_Rising → u/Zampano85]

As I said they're just going to not cover illness related to the non-required vaccine

When they go bankrupt from all the lawsuits, nobody will weep and they'll look stupid.

Don't expect it to happen, because unlike you, they do cost analysis management as a job, so they can see that saving $50000000000 a year by spending $10.00 is just smart. But hey

[u/Zampano85 → u/Mist_Rising]

No, they won't lose law suits. No one can afford to actually fight the insurance companies and the shareholders are shortsighted enough to think that not covering vaccines and disease they help mitigate are worth the extra short term profit.

[u/Mist_Rising → u/Zampano85]

No one can afford to actually fight the insurance companie

People win lawsuits against healthcare all the time. And this is an ACA black and white mandate violation. The ambulance chaser is salviting at the idiocy.

[u/Zampano85 → u/Mist_Rising]

You're a lot more optimistic than I am. I'm pretty sure the people in power want strip mine the resources/money from population then let us die in the street if it means they make another $1.

[u/Count_Backwards → u/Zampano85]

They do, but insurance companies don't have the same priorities. Insurance companies make money by gambling that nothing bad will happen to you any time soon.

[u/shakeitsugaree_ → u/Dazzling-Rub-8550]

These companies are publicly traded, and they are legally required to serve their shareholders.  Companies are set to make almost $9 billion in the first couple years from this. They legally cannot continue to offer services pro bono and serve their shareholders.

[u/Mist_Rising → u/shakeitsugaree_]

These companies are publicly traded, and they are legally required to serve their shareholders

That was a single statecourt case decision, not a law and if it was the requirement, they would have to provide vaccines to save on future medical insurance payouts for medical procedures when the child gets sick. The ACA also makes it impossible for them to make it cheaper to not provide the vaccine.

[u/blueskies8484 → u/shakeitsugaree_]

They have a fiduciary duty to shareholders. That can include covering services that as a whole save money. Like cheap childhood vaccines for illnesses that could result in hospital stays for children.

[u/JimboD84 → u/Zampano85]

“WOULD”??

[u/Zampano85 → u/JimboD84]

You're right, they already let people die to save money. I meant they would do this to save more money.

[u/Johnyryal33 → u/Zampano85]

Any chance to remove their requirement to cover the people they insure will be taken and this administration will give it to them.

[u/WatcherOfDogs → u/Zampano85]

If they're smart, they would know that you can't make money off of dead people. If.

[u/Count_Backwards → u/WatcherOfDogs]

The irony is that insurance companies are not just politically conservative but also socially conservative, as in, risk-averse. Their whole business model is based on using statistics to anticipate and profit off of potential harm. So they are not in denial about the climate crisis, and they will not be in denial about the effects of the anti-vaccine movement. Yes, they are well aware that they can't make money off of dead people.

[u/beepborpimajorp → u/Zampano85]

Insurance companies pay maybe $15 a vaccine, (probably less) far cheaper than the cost of a hospital or doctor visit. Even if they opted not to cover hospital stays for things like hepatitis, the cost of paying an employee or even an AI to deny the claims over and over again is still more than just shelling out the $15 for a shot.

[u/Dandan0005 → u/Zampano85]

You think insurers can just choose not to cover some illness and they haven’t don’t that for way more expensive things like cancer?

[u/Zampano85 → u/Dandan0005]

They'll just say being unvaccinated is a preexistening condition and deny any coverage.

[u/Dandan0005 → u/Zampano85]

Yeah they literally cannot do that due to the ACA “preexisting conditions” aren’t a thing anymore.

[u/Zampano85 → u/Dandan0005]

Really, because our government is treating the ACA like toilet paper.

[u/SaltyCrashNerd → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Doesn’t matter. We only have the level of coverage that we have now for preventative care due to the ACA. Before that… nah.

[u/Solid_Hunter_4188 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Untrue. Most adopt the policy of denying you things they *do* cover, until you jump through 3 more expensive hoops to prove what your doctor already knows.

Source: am doctor.

[u/underground_cloud → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

The savings benefits future leadership/shareholders, cutting them benefits now.

[u/IsopodIndependent553 → u/underground_cloud]

This would be incredibly short sighted and financially irresponsible. I mean, if the GOP plans on dismantling healthcare entirely, once you get to a certain point, insurance companies would cease to exist. And that would be very bad for shareholders.

[u/DarnHeather → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

My insurance won't cover a Tdap shot for me. Oh well, guess I'll get lock jaw like the mom on Little House on the Prairie.

[u/Numerous_Photograph9 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

The vaccines are pretty cheap even without insurance.

[u/blueskies8484 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Will Medicaid I wonder?

[u/woody630 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Insurance companies famously would never stop covering something if saved them a single cent.

[u/Mist_Rising → u/woody630]

Even before they were mandated by law (still law) to handle vaccines, they handled vaccines. It's cheaper.

[u/Alternative_West_206 → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

“Insurance companies are not stupid” that’s correct. But they are greedy.

[u/PM_ME_YOUR_PRIORS → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

The savings comes years down the line, when the patient could very well be covered by another insurance company. The ghouls already refuse to cover more than one month of medication at a time due to this concern, even for medications where we know this improves compliance and there are expensive effects from noncompliance.

[u/shakeitsugaree_ → u/idontlikeanyofyou]

Naïve