Aluminum salts emerge as likely target as health officials scrutinize childhood vaccines

With further changes to the U.S.’ recommended vaccine schedule likely in the year ahead under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s leadership, his agency’s recent scrutiny of one vaccine additive in particular - aluminum salts - may offer a clue about what’s to come. Retsef Levi listens during a meeting of the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices on Dec. 5 in Atlanta.Elijah Nouvelage / Getty Images A person holds a vial of the Varivax vaccine, which protects against chickenpox, in Los Angeles on Oct. 24.Patrick T. Fallon / AFP via Getty Images Earlier this month, members of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee - whom Kennedy selected after firing the previous group - suggested digging into concerns about aluminum salts, though large studies have found them to be safe. Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, told NBC News that the committee is “reviewing the body of science related to aluminum and other possible contaminants in childhood vaccine[s].” Similarly, a statement that appeared on the CDC website last month said that HHS is investigating whether aluminum in vaccines could be linked to autism. Aluminum salts are not a “contaminant” in vaccines: The compound is added as an adjuvant, an ingredient that boosts the body’s immune response to a vaccine, allowing for a smaller dose to be used. Nearly a century of evidence has found it to be safe for this purpose. Aluminum salts are naturally present in soil and water, and the amount children are exposed to from vaccines is minuscule compared with cumulative daily exposures from food. ( Exposure from infant formula or breastmilk is higher than exposure from vaccines in the first six months of life, as well.) “This is not the thing that you wrap your food in at the barbecue. ... The purpose of them is to just help the immune system respond a little more robustly to that vaccine,” said Dr. Michelle Fiscus, chief medical officer at the Association of Immunization Managers, a nonprofit that supports public vaccination programs. “Aluminum adjuvants have made vaccines very, very effective and have helped us significantly reduce suffering and sickness and death,” she added. Skeptical or negative statements about aluminum have cropped up repeatedly during federal health announcements and meetings in recent months. President Donald Trump in September said aluminum was being “taken out of the vaccines” during a news conference in which he and Kennedy warned that Tylenol use in pregnancy may be linked to autism. (The bulk of scientific research has not identified such a link.) “Who the hell wants that pumped into a body?” Trump said of aluminum. Then, during the CDC’s vaccine advisory panel meeting, Dr. Tracy Beth Høeg, acting director of the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, argued for adopting the vaccine schedule that Denmark uses, which is sparser than in the U.S., in part because doing so would reduce aluminum exposure. “I do not feel like we have...

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