The Vaccine RFK Jr. Doesn’t Want You to Hear About

Why France Is More Like the United States

The obvious reason to consider France is that it resembles the United States much more closely than Denmark does. It has the third-largest economy in Western Europe, with a population of nearly seventy million—literally ten times that of Denmark. France does not have the kind of economic inequality found in the United States—as indeed, no democracy in Western or Northern Europe does—but its socioeconomic distribution more closely resembles that of the United States than that of Denmark. Even the French healthcare system is a better analog to that of the United States. It provides universal coverage through a mixed public-private system in which access can vary depending on the type of insurance and wealth. But there is something else about France that makes its experience relevant. Like the United States, France has a vocal anti-vaccination movement, rooted in part in a political culture that favors a strong government but is, by European standards, distrustful of the people and institutions that govern it.

“I think we’re one of the world leaders when it comes to vaccine hesitancy,” Muhamed Kheir-Taha, who heads the invasive bacterial infections unit at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, told me. Survey data support this. This tradition helps explain the evolution of French vaccination laws. When the first vaccines for diseases such as smallpox and polio became available in the early and mid-twentieth century, France made them mandatory, meaning they were a requirement for attending school. But as new vaccines, such as the one against measles, became available, French authorities simply “recommended” them, which meant, among other things, that the national health system did not always cover the cost. But the push to change policies reached a critical mass about twenty years ago, partly because doctors and public health experts were concerned that vaccination rates for diseases like measles and whooping cough were falling below herd immunity levels.

What fascinates me about the French approach is that it wasn’t imposed from above without debate. The authorities listened to the public’s concerns. They organized public meetings. They allowed people to voice their opinions. And then, they based their decision on science, on the recommendations of the country’s most respected experts. The result? In 2017, France added eight new vaccines to the mandatory list. And last year, in 2024, it added the meningococcal vaccine to the mandatory list. Not because the French are obedient sheep. But because they understood that science, transparent information, and public dialogue can lead to collective decisions that protect everyone. That’s what we call democracy in action. And that’s exactly what RFK Jr. is destroying in the United States with his arbitrary and non-transparent decisions.

France Strengthens Protection Against Meningitis

French officials responded by commissioning expert reports and then convening public meetings so that the public would have the opportunity both to hear the recommendations and to share their feedback. The effort culminated in a 2017 law that added eight new vaccines to the mandatory list. The most recent meningococcal vaccine was not initially included, as French authorities weighed the costs and benefits of each vaccine in the context of allocating funds within the national health insurance system. They had decided that these other strains of meningococcal disease were too rare to justify the expense. But the disease turned out not to be all that rare, with an increase in cases and outbreaks in group settings such as schools. “We were getting a lot of media attention for these cases, even when there was just one case, because they affected children or young adults in very good health, and then they could die within a few hours,” Taha said.

French authorities had an action plan for these situations. They could ramp up vaccination efforts in affected areas, aiming to protect people before they were exposed and developed the disease, while rushing to treat those who were already sick. But meningococcal disease acts so quickly that these intensified efforts were inevitably too late for some. “The best way to avoid this disease, we told them, is to prevent it, not to treat it afterward,” Hervé Haas, president of the French Association of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, explained to me. Once again, French authorities listened to doctors and public health experts. In 2024, they added the second meningococcal vaccine to the mandatory list. The hope is that the requirement will significantly improve uptake, which is what happened with the vaccines that France made mandatory in 2017.

Here again, the difference from the American approach is striking. France first tried the “voluntary” approach that RFK Jr. now wants to impose in the United States. And it didn’t work. Children continued to die. Outbreaks continued to occur. So the French authorities did what any rational society should do: they acknowledged their mistake and corrected it. They made the vaccine mandatory in January 2025. Why? Because children’s lives matter more than ideological principles. Because preventing a child’s death is well worth a few extra shots. It’s pure common sense. And that’s what the Trump administration refuses to see.

The Lack of Public Consultation and Independent Expertise

The strategy that France abandoned—making the vaccine strictly voluntary and then ramping up resources to stop outbreaks once they begin—is similar to the one that the Kennedy and Trump administrations have just adopted. But if you look at this assessment memo that the HHS published in January, you won’t find any acknowledgment that the French have recently adopted the meningococcal vaccine, let alone any explanation of why the authors believe the United States should move in the exact opposite direction. In fact, you’ll find no reference to France, nor any indication that the memo’s authors seriously studied the experience of European countries other than Denmark. When I asked HHS explicitly about this—whether larger, more comparable nations like France, Germany, and the United Kingdom had received the same consideration as Denmark—I received a standard response.

“Many peer countries achieve high vaccination rates without mandates by relying on trust, education, and strong doctor-patient relationships,” wrote Emily Hilliard, an HHS spokesperson, in an email, “and HHS will work with states and clinicians to ensure that families have clear and accurate information to make their own informed decisions. ” Hilliard also described the review as “comprehensive,” echoing what Kennedy said, though it’s a bit difficult to take that seriously when the entire assessment is only thirty pages long. And because it’s a memo justifying decisions on multiple vaccinations, it devotes only limited attention to each one. The explanatory section on meningococcal disease is only four paragraphs long—barely two hundred words. Just for comparison, the document the CDC used in 2013 when it first recommended the newer meningococcal vaccine was about eighteen thousand words long—focusing solely on the meningococcal vaccine—and included highly detailed reviews of the research, projections on how different recommendations would play out in the real world, and other types of information that policymakers would want to consider when making these kinds of decisions.

Thirty pages. Thirty pages to justify removing several vaccines from the U.S. immunization schedule. Thirty pages to change the public health policy that protects millions of children. Let me be clear: this is not an “exhaustive” process. It’s a joke. It’s an insult to the intelligence of Americans. It’s a betrayal of the public’s trust. The CDC’s 2013 document was 18,000 words long on a single vaccine. Kennedy’s memo has barely two hundred words on the meningococcal vaccine. How can anyone claim that science is guiding this decision? How can anyone claim to have reviewed all the evidence when they don’t even devote a minimum amount of time and effort to documenting it? The answer is simple: they can’t. This decision has nothing to do with science. It has everything to do with ideology.

A Process Lacking Integrity and Transparency

This 18,000-word document reflects the work that went into it—literally years of study and debate—with the CDC director ultimately making decisions following public votes by the committee of external experts. Nothing of the sort happened this year, despite Kennedy’s promises of “radical transparency.” ” The CDC simply announced the decision one day, without warning, with the director signing off on a recommendation he received from the heads of three other government agencies. “Barring a genuine emergency, our government shouldn’t wake up in the morning, brush its teeth, and abruptly announce major changes to a long-standing policy,” Joshua Sharfstein, a pediatrician and former deputy commissioner at the FDA who is now on the faculty at Johns Hopkins University, told me. “The basis for a change in course should be published well in advance, reviewed by independent experts, and modified as necessary through careful consideration and explanation. It is a process conducted with integrity that distinguishes thoughtful decision-making from a power grab.”

To justify its decision, the Trump administration’s memo cites a report from the World Health Organization, which recommended society-wide vaccination only in countries where case numbers are higher than in the United States. But the primary audience for the WHO’s guidelines is officials trying to make the most of scarce medical resources. That’s not how things work here—for better or worse, depending on your point of view. The U.S. system spends all kinds of money to save lives, even on interventions that cost far more than vaccination, because that’s what wealthier countries do when they want to prioritize health. “Once you’ve seen a case of meningococcal disease, you find yourself thinking, ‘My God, I never want to see a case like that again,’” Rochelle Walensky, a pediatric infectious disease specialist affiliated with Harvard and former director of the CDC, told me.

Joshua Sharfstein is right. What happened in the United States in January 2026 is not public health policy. It is a power grab, plain and simple. A small group of ideologues, led by RFK Jr., decided they knew better than decades of research, than thousands of experts, than millions of doctors. They ignored the normal process. They disregarded transparency. They disregarded integrity. And they did so arrogantly, with utter contempt for the lives they are putting at risk. This is unacceptable in a democracy. It is dangerous for public health. And it is immoral.

A disease that strikes with terrifying speed

“When you’ve seen a perfectly healthy, young, vibrant person suddenly struck down by bacterial meningitis, and you know that their life will never be the same again, then the answer is that if there’s anything I can do to prevent that—if I can prevent it safely—you’re going to do it,” Rochelle Walensky continued. Another person who understands the threat of the disease all too well is Antoine. And he wants to do something about it. He and Claire have raised funds to support research on the disease and promote training for medical professionals, so they’ll be better able to recognize it quickly. They’ve worked with local and national groups affiliated with the Confederation of Meningitis Organizations, an international organization based in the United Kingdom that seeks to promote awareness and research worldwide. They’ve also tried to do what they can to spread the word about the vaccine among friends and professional contacts. Antoine is a consultant who works with banks on regulatory compliance, and Claire is a lawyer.

Antoine told me he was “pretty upset” recently when he heard that a friend had been advised by a doctor not to get the vaccine because they weren’t part of a high-risk group. “It’s a big struggle for us,” he said. Before our video call ended, Antoine shared a few photos, all of Isaac smiling exactly as I’d been told he would. And when Antoine finished recounting that terrible day last April, he told me about the quiet memorial service they’d held at the hospital and the funeral, with about a hundred family members and friends in attendance. Antoine said that he and Claire had taken care to swaddle Isaac in his favorite blanket with sheep and stars on it, and to make sure he had his beloved stuffed monkey with him. The cemetery is near their apartment. Antoine said he goes there every day.

When Antoine told me he visits his son’s grave every day, my heart broke. I can’t even imagine the pain. The absolute emptiness. The unbearable silence of a home where a baby should be laughing, babbling, discovering the world. Isaac was only four months old. He hadn’t even started walking or really talking yet. He had lived only a fraction of what he should have lived. And all because of a microscopic bacterium, because of a six-week administrative delay, because of a healthcare system that wasn’t fast enough. Antoine and Claire aren’t statistics. They aren’t numbers in a table. They are heartbroken parents whose world came crashing down in a matter of hours. And they deserve better than RFK Jr.’s irresponsible ideological politics.

The Invisible Burden Weighing on Families

The hours following that fateful morning remain a blur, Antoine told me. “I lost my footing, I lost my bearings, my legs were shaking all day,” he said, searching for the right English words to capture a state of mind as much as anything physical. Less than twenty-four hours earlier, Antoine had played with Isaac on the terrace of a café, making the baby smile with his favorite stuffed monkey that played music when squeezed. When Claire had rocked Isaac to sleep, holding him against her chest—as had become their routine—he seemed perfectly normal. Now, the doctors were inducing a medically induced coma, which they said was his best hope for survival. Claire, who had rushed back to Paris by train, arrived at the hospital shortly afterward, and for a moment, it seemed as though the treatment might work. Isaac’s vital signs even improved slightly.

But the recovery was illusory, and his condition deteriorated. His heart stopped three times. The doctors were able to revive him after the first two episodes. They were unable to do so after the third. At 6:35 p.m., Isaac was gone. Meningococcal disease strikes without warning. It does not discriminate. It strikes babies, children, teenagers, and adults. It strikes the rich and the poor. It strikes developed and developing countries alike. And it strikes with such speed that it leaves families speechless and helpless, with only memories of a normal morning that turned into an absolute nightmare in a matter of hours. Vaccines are our only real defense. Our only shield against this invisible bacterium that can destroy lives so quickly.

What terrifies me about this story is its apparent ordinariness. Antoine and Claire did nothing wrong. They weren’t negligent. They weren’t ignorant. They trusted the medical system. They followed the recommendations. And yet, the system let them down. Six weeks. That’s all it took for the bacteria to find Isaac, invade him, and destroy him. Six weeks of bureaucratic delays. Six weeks of appointments that never happened. Six weeks that changed Antoine and Claire’s lives forever. And now, RFK Jr. wants to create millions of situations like this one. He wants American parents to wait, debate, and hesitate. He wants vaccines to become an option, not automatic protection. And during that hesitation, those debates, that waiting, the bacteria doesn’t sleep. It searches. It strikes. It kills.

Denmark Is Not the Model That U.S. Officials Claim It Is

Officials in the Trump administration have repeatedly said that Denmark is their model for the new U.S. vaccine policy. But a closer look at the Danish recommendations reveals that the reality is far more complex than Kennedy and his team are willing to admit. Denmark recommends eleven vaccines for all children, compared to the twelve currently recommended in the United States. But Denmark is an anomaly in the developed world, not the norm. Most comparable countries recommend between thirteen and sixteen vaccines for all children. Canada, for example, recommends sixteen vaccines, including those against rotavirus and meningitis. Australia recommends fifteen vaccines. The United Kingdom recommends thirteen. Even Guinea-Bissau, a low-income country in West Africa, recommends twelve vaccines for all its children, according to a database maintained by the World Health Organization.

Kate O’Brien, the WHO’s Director of Immunization, Vaccines, and Biologicals, said she had never heard of another country removing vaccines from its childhood immunization schedule unless there were serious safety concerns—especially without going through a public process to explain the rationale for such a decision. “I don’t know of any other example where a country has dramatically and substantially changed its immunization program. I don’t know of any other example,” she noted, pointing out that other countries are working to add vaccines to their programs. The truth is that the United States is not “aligning” with any international consensus. Rather, it is becoming the negative exception—the developed country that is moving backward while all others are moving forward toward greater protection for their children.

Kate O’Brien is right: she has never seen a country withdraw vaccines without a safety concern. Because that’s just not done. It’s counterintuitive. It goes against everything we know about public health. When a vaccine exists, when it’s safe, when it’s effective, a rational country adopts it, recommends it, and makes it accessible. It doesn’t withdraw it. Except in the United States in 2026, apparently. Under the leadership of RFK Jr., the United States is becoming a textbook example of poor public health policy. An example not to be followed. An aberration that future generations will look upon with disbelief and horror.

International variations mask a convergence toward protection

It is true that vaccination recommendations vary from country to country. These variations reflect differences in local epidemiology, health system structures, available resources, and political priorities. But there is a fundamental consensus that transcends these variations: vaccines save lives, and high vaccination coverage is a goal shared by all countries serious about public health. Kennedy’s argument that the United States should align itself with a purported international consensus by shortening its vaccination schedule is not only factually incorrect but dangerous in its implications. It suggests that less protection is acceptable, and that preventing serious diseases is an option rather than a moral obligation of society toward its most vulnerable children.

The reality is that most peer countries have vaccination recommendations much closer to the old U.S. schedule than to the new one. Denmark is the exception, not the rule. And even in Denmark, authorities still recommend some of the vaccines that Kennedy has removed from the U.S. schedule, but in different categories. The Trump administration’s decision is not based on a rigorous analysis of the evidence or an honest assessment of international practices. It is based on a careful selection of information that supports a preconceived ideological position. This is bad science. It is bad policy. And it is dangerous for the health of American children.

I’m tired of these half-truths, these calculated omissions, and this manipulation of information. RFK Jr. and his team aren’t seeking the truth. They’re seeking to justify a decision that’s already been made. They twist the data until it says what they want to hear. They ignore anything that doesn’t fit their narrative. This is pure disinformation. And in the field of public health, disinformation isn’t just wrong—it kills.

Challenges for Pediatricians and Families

Changes to the vaccination schedule could create new challenges for pediatricians as they consider how to advise their patients on vaccines and which vaccines to stock. Daniel Jernigan, former director of the CDC’s National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Diseases, said pediatricians will struggle to meet the demand for additional visits that the shared clinical decision-making policy will require. “By making these vaccines a shared clinical decision, this introduces yet another barrier preventing a child from receiving a life-saving vaccine,” he said. WHO’s O’Brien said that removing the hepatitis B vaccine from the list of recommended vaccines will cause enormous problems in doctors’ offices, most of which administer combination vaccines to young infants. The vaccine given to protect against diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, Hib, and polio includes hepatitis B.

Most doctors do not stock individual vaccines for these diseases; in fact, manufacturers do not produce enough of these vaccines in single-dose formulations to supply the U.S. market, experts warned. “I don’t know what product they think they’re going to use,” she noted, pointing out that this move could result in babies having to receive three separate injections—over multiple doctor visits—instead of the current combination vaccine. “It’s a curious decision to make.” ” The American Medical Association, the nation’s largest group of healthcare providers, criticized the change in a statement. “When long-standing recommendations are changed without a robust, evidence-based process, it undermines public trust and puts children at unnecessary risk of vaccine-preventable diseases,” wrote Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, a member of the AMA’s board of directors.

Daniel Jernigan is right: every additional barrier is a life potentially lost. Every additional “discussion,” every additional “shared decision,” is an opportunity for disease to strike. Pediatricians aren’t robots. They have 24-hour days. They have hundreds of patients. They don’t have time to debate at length with every parent about the necessity of every vaccine. And even if they did have the time, why create this artificial debate? Why turn the protection of children into a topic of discussion when the science is clear? Vaccines work. They save lives. Period.

Increased Risks for Vulnerable Communities

States and universities can still require vaccines, but red states in particular might follow HHS guidelines. The result would be a patchwork of vaccine regulations, which could mean gaps in national protection against pathogens. “There’s going to be massive confusion,” said Lawrence Gostin, a legal expert on global health at Georgetown University. “Insurance companies will be confused. Patients will be confused. States will be confused.” This confusion will be particularly harmful to already vulnerable communities: low-income families who rely on public programs for access to care, communities of color that have historically faced health disparities, and rural areas where access to care is already limited. It is these communities that will pay the highest price for RFK Jr.’s ideology.

And it’s not just meningitis that threatens us. Rotavirus, which causes severe and potentially fatal diarrhea in young children. The flu, which kills thousands of Americans every year. Hepatitis A and B, which can cause serious and permanent liver disease. All of these vaccines, previously recommended for all children, are now relegated to a “shared decision-making” category or reserved solely for high-risk groups. Yet these diseases do not discriminate. They do not strike only “high-risk” groups. They strike everywhere, all the time, as soon as community protection wanes. And it will wane. Inevitably.

I’m thinking of parents in rural communities, working-poor families in cities, and immigrant families who are already navigating a complex and often hostile healthcare system. How will they make sense of this new system? How will they know which vaccines their children should receive? How will they find the time, the money, and the access to navigate this bureaucratic maze that RFK Jr. has created? The answer is simple: they won’t be able to. And their children will suffer. Because public health is about protecting everyone, not just those who have the resources and knowledge to navigate the system.

The Importance of Community-Wide Vaccination

One of the key arguments in favor of universal vaccination is the concept of herd immunity. When a sufficient proportion of a population is vaccinated against a contagious disease, the disease struggles to spread, thereby protecting even those who cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons, such as newborns, people with cancer, or those with severe allergies to vaccine components. By removing vaccines from the universal immunization schedule, the Trump administration is ending this collective protection, putting at risk not only children whose parents choose not to vaccinate them, but also those who cannot be vaccinated and who rely on community protection to stay safe. Isaac, the French baby who died of meningitis in April 2025, might have been protected if more people around him had been vaccinated, thereby reducing the circulation of the bacteria in the community.

This reality is particularly relevant to meningococcal disease. Meningococcal conjugate vaccines not only protect against invasive disease but also help protect against colonization, Adam Ratner, an American infectious disease expert and author of Vaccine Boosters, explained to me. “If you vaccinate a large portion of the population, you simply have fewer people who are colonized. So it helps.” Tina Tan, a professor at Northwestern University and former president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, gave me a similar answer. “Vaccination with MenACWY conjugate vaccines reduces asymptomatic nasopharyngeal carriage. Widespread vaccination REDUCES TRANSMISSION.” In other words, universal vaccination doesn’t just protect the vaccinated individual. It protects the entire community, especially the most vulnerable.

This is what RFK Jr. does not understand—or refuses to understand. Vaccination is not a purely personal, individual decision. It is an act of community responsibility. By protecting myself, I protect you. By protecting my children, I protect your children. This is how a civilized society works. We take care of one another. We recognize that my freedom ends where your health begins. This isn’t a matter of individual freedoms. It’s a matter of solidarity. Of community. Of mutual responsibility. And by destroying this solidarity, RFK Jr. isn’t making Americans freer. He’s making them more vulnerable. More isolated. More at risk.

The Human and Economic Cost of Preventable Diseases

Supporters of the new policy argue that it will save money by not routinely vaccinating against rare diseases. But this argument fails to account for the true cost—both human and economic—of preventable epidemics. Treating a single case of meningococcal meningitis costs hundreds of thousands of dollars in intensive care, often without success. Survivors may require years of rehabilitation, surgeries, and specialized medical care. Parents like Antoine and Claire will have to live with grief and loss for the rest of their lives. Communities will suffer the collective trauma of seeing their children fall ill and die from diseases we knew how to prevent.

And then there is the broader economic cost. Parents who must take time off work to care for sick children. The loss of productivity due to illness. The costs of responding to outbreaks, emergency vaccination campaigns, and quarantine measures. All of this costs far more than the cost of the vaccines themselves. Vaccines are one of the most cost-effective interventions in medicine. Every dollar invested in vaccination saves dozens in avoided healthcare costs. By reducing vaccination coverage, the Trump administration isn’t saving money. It’s shifting the cost of vaccines—which are predictable and manageable—to the cost of epidemics, which are unpredictable and catastrophic. This is poor financial management. It’s bad health policy. And it’s immoral.

Who can put a price on a child’s life? Who can calculate the cost of losing Isaac to Antoine and Claire? There is no number, no equation, no chart that can capture this pain. These are lives. Hopes. Futures. Laughter. Hugs. First steps. First words. Birthdays. Graduations. Weddings. Grandchildren. All of this, potentially, wiped out by a bacterium we knew how to prevent. Just to save a few dollars on vaccines? It’s absurd. It’s monstrous. It’s unacceptable.

The Urgency to Act Before It’s Too Late

The U.S. vaccination schedule, once a model for the world, is now becoming an anomaly. A warning. An example of what happens when ideology trumps science, when politics trumps public health, when personal biases trump children’s lives. Doctors, scientists, and public health organizations have all issued warnings. The American Academy of Pediatrics has called the changes “dangerous and unnecessary.” The American Medical Association has criticized the lack of an evidence-based process. The World Health Organization has expressed concern. But these warnings seem to fall on deaf ears at the White House. Yet time is running out. Every day that passes without the policy being reversed is a day when more children remain vulnerable. Every day that vaccination rates drop is a day when the risk of an outbreak increases.

Antoine and Claire know what that risk means. They live with it every day. Antoine visits his son’s grave every day. Claire carries the memory of Isaac in her heart every moment. They can’t change what happened. They can’t bring Isaac back. But they can try to prevent other families from experiencing the same tragedy. They can share their story. They can advocate for vaccination. They can try to make a difference. And we can help them. We can demand better from our government. We can demand that our children’s health be a priority. We can demand that public health decisions be based on science, not ideology. We can demand that vaccine protection be maintained, strengthened, and expanded. Because every child deserves to live. Every family deserves to be protected. Every community deserves to be safe.

When I think about the future, I feel a deep sense of fear. Not for myself, but for the children. For babies like Isaac, who have no voice, who cannot defend themselves, who depend entirely on us to protect them. RFK Jr. has betrayed that trust. He has used his power to weaken children’s protection, not to strengthen it. He has chosen ideology over science, politics over health, and ego over life. This isn’t just bad policy. It’s a moral crime. And we must not accept it. We must not remain silent. We must not let ideologues destroy decades of progress in public health. We must stand up. We must speak out. We must take action. Because children are dying. Literally. Right now. In the United States, in France, everywhere where vaccine protection is compromised. And we can stop it. We must stop it.