Trump signs order to limit childhood vaccinations

What happened

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order proposing a reduction in routine childhood immunizations to 11 from 17, and pushing for the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine to be split into three separate single-disease shots administered over several doctor visits. This is Trump’s third attempt to “promote his long-held but discredited theory that childhood shots should be spaced out,” The Associated Press said, and a continuation of his fixation on “connecting autism to vaccines,” even though “scientific consensus and decades of studies have firmly concluded there is no link.”

Who said what

“Nothing bad can happen from what we’re doing,” Trump said before signing the order. But pediatricians and public health experts have “long warned” that spreading out vaccinations “will reduce immunization rates and leave children more susceptible to disease,” CNN said.

Trump’s “renewed focus on vaccines marks a departure” from his administration’s “recent efforts to emphasize less controversial health policies” ahead of November elections, the AP said. Trump’s “own pollsters have warned” that the issue is “unpopular” with voters, Politico said. But the president’s “personal interest” in changing vaccine policy has been “thrown into high gear by his allegiance with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” a longtime vaccine skeptic.

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What next?

It’s unclear whether Trump’s order “has any legal power,” The New York Times said. Federal immunization recommendations come from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its outside experts, and “only states can require vaccinations for children to enter school or day care.”