The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is facing renewed questions over corporate influence in vaccine recommendations after a screenshot surfaced showing the organization's top corporate donors.
The image, shared Tuesday on X by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., revealed that four of the largest pharmaceutical companies are listed among the academy's highest-level contributors.
The screenshot, which Kennedy said came directly from the AAP's website, identified Merck, Moderna, Pfizer, and Sanofi as "Presidential Circle" donors -- each contributing $50,000 or more annually to the AAP's "Friends of Children's Fund."
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In return, the companies receive invitations to an exclusive Corporate Summit hosted each summer at AAP's national headquarters in Itasca, Illinois.
Kennedy, appointed HHS Secretary under President Donald Trump, noted that these same four companies manufacture nearly every vaccine on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) recommended childhood schedule.
He argued that their financial relationship with AAP raises concerns over whether pediatric vaccine guidance is influenced by corporate sponsorship.
"These four companies make virtually every vaccine on the CDC-recommended childhood vaccine schedule," Kennedy wrote on X.
"AAP is angry that CDC has eliminated corporate influence in decisions over vaccine recommendations and returned CDC to gold-standard science and evidence-based medicine, laser-focused on children's health."
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Kennedy further accused AAP of aligning with industry interests by issuing its own vaccine recommendations that diverge from federal health authorities.
"AAP today released its own list of corporate-friendly vaccine recommendations," he added.
"The Trump Administration believes in free speech and AAP has a right to make its case to the American people. But AAP should follow the lead of HHS and disclose conflicts of interest, including its corporate entanglements and those of its journal -- Pediatrics -- so that Americans may ask whether the AAP's recommendations reflect public health interest, or are, perhaps, just a pay-to-play scheme to promote commercial ambitions of AAP's Big Pharma benefactors."
He also emphasized the legal implications of such divergence. "AAP should also be candid with doctors and hospitals that recommendations that diverge from the CDC's official list are not shielded from liability under the 1986 Vaccine Injury Act," Kennedy said, signaling that pharmaceutical companies may no longer enjoy the same protections when recommendations are not aligned with federal policy.
The controversy follows AAP's recent recommendation that children between six months and 23 months old receive a COVID-19 vaccine, even as the CDC and HHS adjusted their official stance under the Trump administration
. Earlier this year, Kennedy announced that the COVID-19 vaccine for healthy children had been removed from the CDC immunization schedule.
Kennedy also addressed the broader impact of mRNA vaccines during a video posted on X by the Department of Health and Human Services.
He stated that federal scientists concluded the shots, promoted as a solution to the pandemic, actually contributed to prolonging it by helping drive the emergence of variants.
"The science has been reviewed, and it shows that the shots forced on the public by the government to supposedly stop the COVID pandemic actually helped cause the variants and caused the pandemic to go on longer," Kennedy said in the video.
According to Kennedy, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) reviewed 22 separate investments in mRNA vaccine development and has since begun canceling them.
The review found that the vaccines failed to prevent infections such as COVID-19, prompting the agency to withdraw nearly half a billion dollars in planned federal support.
The revelations about AAP's corporate ties, combined with HHS's policy shift, mark a significant turning point in the ongoing debate over vaccine policy and pharmaceutical influence.
With AAP recommendations now standing in contrast to federal guidelines, the issue of transparency and accountability is expected to remain at the forefront of public health discussions.
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