Paul Offit, MD, is a world-renowned vaccinologist, the director of the Vaccine Education Center, and an attending physician at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Dr. Offit is also the co-inventor of Rotateq, a rotavirus vaccine.
Infectious Disease Special Edition recently spoke with Dr. Offit about new changes to U.S. vaccine schedules under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
ISDE: Did you anticipate the recent changes in pediatric vaccine recommendations by HHS?
Dr. Offit: I guess I didn’t see this coming to be honest with you, although I should have—given the way things have played out over the past year.
I didn’t imagine that a group of federal appointees would simply go behind closed doors and come up with their own vaccine schedule without in any way talking to either this ACIP [Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices] or getting input from the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.
I understood that President Trump had an executive order, but I just didn’t imagine this.
Why do you think Secretary Kennedy selected these vaccines?
Dr. Offit: I think that he has this basic premise—which is wrong—that children get too many vaccines and so their immune systems are being overwhelmed or weakened and that has resulted in an increase in chronic diseases. That’s wrong. Study after study has shown that’s wrong, no matter what he’s pointed to— whether it’s autism or diabetes or multiple sclerosis.1
He’ll get on TV and say, “When I was a little boy, I only got a couple of vaccines and I’m fine. Children today get many more.”
But one thing he and I share is that we were both children in the 1950s. We were both born before 1955, so both of us got the same vaccines—the smallpox vaccine and the diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus (DPT) vaccine.
It’s not the number of shots that you get that matters. The only thing that matters is the number of immunological components in those shots. So, for example, the smallpox vaccine contained roughly 200 immunological components (viral proteins), and the DPT vaccine had about 3,000 at the time, since it was a whole cell vaccine.2 So, Kennedy and I both received about 3,200 immunologic components in our vaccines. If you add up all the immunologic components in the 18 vaccines children get today it adds up to about 180 immunologic components because of advances in DNA technology and protein chemistry.1,2
So, the premise is wrong, and acting on a false premise has now put children in this country at risk.
What impact will the schedule changes have?
Dr. Offit: That’s the critical question.
The good news is that when HHS came out with this revised schedule, the American Academy of Pediatrics said, “No, here’s the schedule,” pointing to their existing schedule.3 We had almost 300 pediatric deaths from flu last year and here in the midst of what is probably a worse flu season this year, he wants us to back away from vaccination by putting in shared clinical decision-making for vaccines, including rotavirus, COVID-19, and flu, which is another way of saying it’s optional.
The rotavirus vaccine was introduced in 2006. Since then, we’ve virtually eliminated the 70,000 hospitalizations for the infection we used to see before the vaccine.4 Many pediatric residents have never seen an inpatient with rotavirus.
What other concerns do you have?
Dr. Offit: That down the road the Vaccines for Children Program could stop covering the vaccines now listed under shared decision-making and that doctors who recommend those vaccines could be the subject of civil litigation.
Why are there different pediatric vaccine schedules in other industrialized countries?
Those countries make a financial decision about covering the cost of the vaccines. Demark has about 1,200 hospitalizations from rotavirus each year.5 Denmark is about 55 times smaller than the U.S. in population. So, if you multiply that out that equals roughly the 70,000 hospitalizations we would have had.4 We didn’t tolerate that level of suffering because it was preventable and so we pay for that vaccine. They’ve chosen not to do that for financial reasons.
Same thing with RSV. We have a maternal RSV vaccine, and a monoclonal antibody for newborns. They’ve chosen not to do that and so they had 2,800 hospitalizations from RSV last year.6
Denmark should be emulating us and not the other way around.
References
- Geoghegan S, O’Callaghan KP, Offit PA. Vaccine Safety: Myths and Misinformation. Front Microbiol. 2020;11:372. Published 2020 Mar 17. doi:10.3389/fmicb.2020.00372
- Offit PA, Quarles J, Gerber MA, et al. Addressing parents’ concerns: do multiple vaccines overwhelm or weaken the infant’s immune system? Pediatrics. 2002;109(1):124-129. doi:10.1542/peds.109.1.124
- Recommended Child and Adolescent Immunization Schedule for Ages 18 Years or Younger. American Academy of Pediatrics. Updated January 26, 2026. Accessed January 26, 2026. aap.org/ImmunizationSchedule
- Pindyck T, Tate JE, Parashar UD. A decade of experience with rotavirus vaccination in the United States - vaccine uptake, effectiveness, and impact. Expert Rev Vaccines. 2018;17(7):593-606. doi:10.1080/14760584.2018.1489724
- Fischer TK, Rungoe C, Jensen CS, et al. The burden of rotavirus disease in Denmark 2009-2010. Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2011;30(7):e126-e129. doi:10.1097/INF.0b013e3182145277
- Integrated surveillance of respiratory infections in 2024/2025 - consolidated report. Statens Serum Institut. Updated June 18, 2025. Accessed January 22, 2026. en.ssi.dk/surveillance-and-preparedness/surveillance-in-denmark/annual-reports-on-disease-incidence/i/integrated-surveillance-of-respiratory-infections-in-2024-25--consolidated-report
The interview was edited for brevity and clarity. Dr. Offit reported no relevant financial disclosures.
This article is from the February 2026 print issue.