Osterholm Warns Against Ignoring Child Vaccinations

(Learfield News/St. Paul, MN) — The University of Minnesota’s Dr. Michael Osterholm is urging parents to disregard the CDC’s new recommendations that remove six childhood vaccines from its list, calling the move “dangerous.”

He says “All of the actions that the federal government has taken over the past nine to ten months are surely going to lead us to an increased number of cases of vaccine-preventable diseases, and with that, there’ll be new deaths. And that is a real tragedy right now because these are really preventable,”

Osterholm emphasized that the public should consult their health care providers rather than follow the new federal guidelines, which he says are driven by politics, not science.

Among the vaccines no longer recommended for children are those for influenza and hepatitis.

Osterholm warns that rolling back these protections could lead to outbreaks and unnecessary fatalities.