Today, the federal government published an updated charter for its vaccine advisory panel — the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP.

The changes significantly expand its scope, reshape its membership, and reframe how vaccine decisions are made.

The document, signed off by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., was posted on the CDC’s website. It replaces the previous charter with a version that goes well beyond routine renewal and is effective through April 1, 2028.

The move comes just weeks after a federal judge halted most of the committee’s membership, leaving ACIP effectively paralysed.

At first glance, the structure appears familiar. The Health Secretary still appoints members. The committee remains advisory, and its recommendations still flow through the CDC.

But beneath that surface, the changes are substantial — and far-reaching.

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It’s one of the most commonly performed operations for shoulder pain.

In England alone, nearly 30,000 of these procedures are carried out every year. Since 2007/08, it has cost the National Health Service more than £1 billion.

The operation is called arthroscopic subacromial decompression, or ASD.

It’s keyhole surgery on the shoulder.

Surgeons go in and clear out tissue or shave bone to create more space — aiming to relieve pressure and ease pain.

It’s widely used and patients are told it will help.

But one of the most rigorous trials ever conducted on this procedure should make people think twice.

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Across much of the world, the HPV vaccine is delivered through school-based programmes to children aged 11 to 13.

The policy is presented as straightforward: vaccinate early to prevent cervical cancer later in life.

It’s a message that suggests the policy rests on rigorous evidence.

But the clinical trials that established the vaccine’s efficacy in reducing early cervical changes did not study children at the age for which the vaccine is now routinely recommended.

That detail is rarely explained in public messaging — or to parents consenting to their children lining up for the vaccine at school.

To understand how this happened, it is necessary to look closely at the trials that first established the vaccine’s efficacy.

What did they measure? Who did they enrol? And how did those findings become the basis for recommending HPV vaccination for millions of schoolchildren around the world?

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This week, Dr Robert Malone did not quietly step away from the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices (ACIP). He left by tearing into it.

In an extraordinary interview on The HighWire, the former vice-chair delivered a sweeping account of dysfunction inside the federal vaccine advisory system — describing ACIP as a “hot mess,” a “fool’s errand,” and a body that is no longer “providing independent advice to the government.”

Speaking at length about his resignation and the inner workings of the committee, Malone portrayed a system that had been fundamentally “captured” — shaped not only by the CDC bureaucracy but, as Malone alleges, by a “mole” operating inside the administration.

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I’ve spent years looking closely at the role of cholesterol in heart disease, and I keep coming back to the same question: why won’t the lipid hypothesis die?

The idea that LDL cholesterol is a primary cause of heart disease is still debated, but it is no longer treated that way.

It’s embedded in clinical practice, built into guidelines, and repeated in public health messaging with a level of certainty that the underlying evidence does not consistently support.

What’s striking is not just that the model persists, but how it has evolved.

You can see that most clearly in the way the latest US guidelines on cholesterol management and cardiovascular risk have shifted.

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Last week, a federal judge in Massachusetts forced the cancellation of a much-anticipated meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).

Among the materials prepared for discussion was a scientific briefing by Professor Charlotte Kuperwasser of Tufts University School of Medicine, and member of the Covid-19 vaccine workgroup.

The presentation was expected to address a central question about what happens to DNA byproducts in mRNA vaccines once they enter the body.

Earlier this week, Kuperwasser wrote for the Brownstone Institute that while these byproducts are known to be present, data on their fate in the body are not available.

The slides prepared for ACIP go further.

They set out a biological mechanism linking these manufacturing byproducts to immune responses that fail to switch off—matching the pattern of illness reported by patients with vaccine injuries.

Below is an exclusive look at the briefing slides that were never presented to ACIP—and have not been made public until now.

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A social media post by ACIP vice-chair Dr Robert Malone set off a firestorm of speculation today about the fate of the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee.

“ACIP has been disbanded,” he wrote on X, adding that the government would not pursue a legal challenge and would instead move to recreate the committee.

The claim spread rapidly. But within hours, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has pushed back.

“Unless officially announced by us, any assertions about what we are doing next is baseless speculation,” said HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon.

There has been no official confirmation from HHS that ACIP has been dissolved — or that a legal challenge has been abandoned.

What has emerged instead is a system caught between competing signals, with no clear public direction.

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The New York Times has updated its reporting on the leaked vaccine injury report after initially failing to acknowledge that the document had already been made publicly available by MD Reports.

I contacted the paper following publication of its article to request attribution.

The New York Times promptly apologised for the oversight. Credit is due to journalists Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Apoorva Mandavilli for working to correct the story.

The leaked report — a confidential vaccine injury policy document prepared for the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) — was obtained exclusively by MD Reports and published last weekend.

Since then, it has received front-page coverage in The New York Times, bringing national attention to Covid vaccine injuries — an issue that has long struggled for recognition.

The document formed part of ACIP’s meeting materials for the March 18 session and would ordinarily have been posted publicly ahead of the meeting and presented for discussion.

There were concerns in some quarters that publication of the leaked document on MD Reports could disadvantage the vaccine-injured. But the response has been markedly positive.

Many people with Covid vaccine injuries have welcomed the release of the proposed policy, describing it as a turning point — a moment when their experiences were finally acknowledged in a formal policy context by clinicians and scientists.

That sentiment was echoed beyond patient groups.

Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo wrote on X that “most Americans would be shocked to learn that there are still no diagnostic codes” to track vaccine injuries or care for affected patients, calling it “important work by ACIP.”

The fact that The New York Times chose to report the story and elevate it to the front page only reinforces that shift.

Some commentary on social media has attempted to link publication of the report to the cancellation of the ACIP meeting scheduled for March 18–19. That is incorrect. The two matters are separate.

The judge’s decision in AAP v. Kennedy was based on arguments presented during hearings that took place well before the report was published. There is no indication that the judge — already working toward a decision — was even aware of the leak.

If anything, the events of the past week suggest that without publication, the report would have been delayed given the meeting’s cancellation, or potentially remained buried.

Although the cancellation of the ACIP meeting prevented public discussion of the vaccine injury report as planned, HHS officials have indicated the judge’s decision to halt the meeting is likely to be overturned.

In the meantime, the issue has continued to move forward.

On March 18, the patient advocacy group React19 announced what it described as a “breakthrough,” confirming that a proposal for a dedicated ICD-10 diagnostic code to identify adverse effects of Covid-19 vaccines has been accepted into the CDC’s formal review process.

“While this week brought unexpected challenges, progress continued,” the group stated on X.

“Today, March 18th, React19 advanced a proposal to the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics for a dedicated ICD-10 code to identify adverse effects of Covid-19 vaccines. The proposal has now been approved to move forward in the formal review process.”

Submitted by React19 co-chair Dr Joel Wallskog, the proposal reflects one of the key recommendations outlined in the ACIP vaccine injury report.

“This marks an important step toward clinical recognition, accurate documentation, and future research,” the group said, adding that the proposal will now enter a 60-day public comment period, with the potential for inclusion in the U.S. system as early as 2027.

Wallskog added, “You cannot treat what you cannot name. Today, we took a critical step toward naming these conditions and changing the future for patients.”

The decision to cancel the ACIP meeting may have delayed discussion, but the report is now in the public domain.

And the conversation it was meant to inform is no longer confined to closed doors — it is finally being heard.

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Readers who have been following developments around this week’s meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) should be aware of a significant legal development that has emerged.

The meeting has now been cancelled following a federal court ruling that has thrown the committee’s legal status into doubt.

Earlier today, a judge in Massachusetts issued a decision just as ACIP was preparing to meet. Within hours, officials confirmed the committee could not proceed in its current form.

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March 16, 2026

On the weekend I published an investigation based on a confidential report obtained exclusively by MD Reports. The document is a policy paper on vaccine injury scheduled to be discussed at this week’s ACIP meeting.

The report was not publicly available anywhere. After weeks of background work and conversations with sources, I obtained a copy and published it in full on MD Reports so readers could review the document directly.

Stories like this rarely appear out of nowhere.

They usually begin quietly, through relationships built over months or years with people inside institutions — scientists, clinicians, regulators and staff who believe the public deserves to know what is happening behind closed doors.

Cultivating those sources takes time and trust. Much of investigative journalism happens long before anything is published.

After my article appeared over the weekend, the New York Times published its own story covering the same document — which is entirely appropriate.

However, the Times article does not acknowledge that the report was first made available by MD Reports, nor does it link to my original investigation.

I wrote to the reporter, Apoorva Mandavilli, asking whether the article could be updated to include appropriate attribution to MD Reports. So far, I have not received a response.

Journalism has always involved scoops that are later followed up by other outlets. I understand that. But moments like this highlight something about the modern media landscape.

Large media organisations have enormous resources and distribution networks. Independent journalists do not — certainly not me. I rely largely on readers sharing stories and supporting my work directly.

At the same time, the environment for independent reporting has become more difficult.

Substack now requires Australian subscribers to complete age and identity verification, which has affected my subscriber base.

And social media platforms — even those that champion free speech, such as X — manage their algorithms in ways that deprioritise links to certain topics or to sites like Substack.

None of this stops the work. But it does shape the conditions under which independent journalism operates.

Investigative reporting requires patience. It involves obtaining documents, verifying information and presenting the evidence clearly so readers can judge it for themselves.

Independent reporters do this work without corporate backing or institutional funding. I do not have a team handling enquiries, research or marketing.

If you regularly read MD Reports but have not yet taken out a paid subscription, this is one of those moments where your support truly makes a difference.

A subscription is US$75 per year, which amounts to a little over $6 per month.

That support allows me to continue pursuing stories and following the evidence wherever it leads.

If you are able to upgrade to a paid subscription, I would be deeply grateful.

If not, please consider sharing my links with your networks to help others find my work.

Thanks again,

Maryanne

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A leaked report prepared for the Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices (ACIP) finds that many people with long-term illness after Covid-19 vaccination have gone largely unrecognised by the medical system meant to monitor vaccine safety.

The document was written by the Covid-19 vaccine workgroup advising ACIP, chaired by MIT professor Retsef Levi.

The workgroup writes that reforms are “fundamental and necessary to regain public trust in vaccination programs that have moral and bioethical obligations for solidarity, justice and equity.”

The document, obtained exclusively by MD Reports, arrives amid political sensitivities surrounding the issue. ACIP’s scheduled February meeting was abruptly cancelled without a public explanation.

A senior CDC researcher familiar with the situation, speaking on condition of anonymity, suggested the report may have been politically delicate.

“Obviously there were some politics involved when the February ACIP meeting was postponed,” the researcher told MD Reports. “But I think the workgroup itself generally supported the document.”

The researcher added that they “wholeheartedly support” the policy document, noting that it is “long overdue to acknowledge and treat the vaccine-injured.”

The report has not yet been publicly released and is expected to be discussed at ACIP’s upcoming meeting on March 18–19. Levi declined to comment.

The system’s blind spot

The report focuses on what it calls Post-Acute Covid-19 Vaccination Syndrome, or PACVS.

The term refers to symptoms that persist for at least 12 weeks after vaccination and cannot be explained by another medical condition.

Patients with PACVS often present with complex, multi-system illness. Symptoms may involve the nervous system, the cardiovascular system, the immune system, the endocrine system and the autonomic nervous system.

The clinical picture varies widely. Some people develop severe fatigue, cognitive impairment, neuropathy or dysautonomia.

Others experience chest pain, immune disturbances or endocrine problems. Symptoms often fluctuate and evolve over time, making early diagnosis difficult.

Clinical features frequently overlap with long Covid — including fatigue, cognitive impairment, dysautonomia, neuropathy, chest pain and immune disturbances.

Yet many patients fall into a diagnostic no-man’s-land, particularly in the early stages of illness.

Some eventually meet criteria for recognised conditions such as postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), small fibre neuropathy or ME/CFS.

But even then, the path to recognition can take years.

The workgroup argues that these difficulties do not necessarily reflect the absence of disease. Instead, they reflect the limits of the systems used to detect and classify illness.

The surveillance gap

A major problem identified in the report is the limitations of existing surveillance systems.

The United States has multiple systems designed to detect vaccine injuries, but most were built to capture acute reactions — events that occur within days or weeks of vaccination.

Persistent, evolving illness does not fit easily into those frameworks.

In practice, vaccine injuries are mainly tracked through broad diagnostic codes and passive reporting systems such as the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

These systems depend heavily on clinicians recognising a problem and reporting it.

But when symptoms develop gradually, involve multiple organs, or resemble other conditions, they are far harder to classify.

The report notes that there is currently no specific diagnostic code for chronic post-vaccination illness. There are also no standard diagnostic guidelines and no coordinated system for long-term follow-up.

The result is a fragmented landscape.

Doctors struggle to document cases, insurance claims may be rejected and patients may move between specialists without a unifying diagnosis.

When cases are recorded inconsistently, they rarely appear clearly in aggregated safety data. That can create the impression that such injuries are rare — even when the surveillance system itself is unable to detect them properly.

The workgroup also raises a troubling clinical concern.

Some patients who developed symptoms after their first vaccine dose were advised, and in some cases pressured, to continue vaccination. Some reported that their symptoms worsened after subsequent doses.

The report concludes that the failure to recognise injury has distorted risk–benefit assessments, compromised patient care and eroded public trust.

Three reforms

The workgroup proposes three reforms:

First, it calls for the creation of specific ICD-10 diagnostic codes for persistent post-vaccination illness.

Diagnostic codes are the backbone of modern healthcare: without them, conditions cannot be reliably documented, reimbursed, researched or incorporated into guidelines.

The report notes that when long Covid received its own code, recognition and surveillance improved rapidly.

Second, it recommends formal diagnostic guidelines and clinician training.

Many post-vaccination illnesses do not appear on standard medical tests. Recognising them may require clinicians to evaluate patterns of symptoms and disease evolution rather than relying solely on laboratory findings.

Most doctors have never been trained to recognise vaccine injuries in that way.

Third, it proposes a national network of specialist centres for long Covid and post-vaccination injury, coordinated by the CDC.

Modelled on the Children’s Oncology Group, such a network would pool expertise, standardise care, collect biospecimens and follow patients longitudinally — shifting surveillance from passive reporting to active investigation.

What happens next?

The proposal will now go before ACIP for consideration.

The next ACIP meeting, scheduled for March 18–19, will be the first real test of whether this moves from paper to policy.

If adopted, the recommendations would mark a profound shift in how vaccine injuries are recognised, monitored and treated in the United States.

For injured patients and their families, this is more than a policy document. It signals formal recognition after years of dismissal — validation after being told their suffering was imagined or coincidental.

For clinicians who have tried to care for these patients without clear guidance, the proposals could provide long-overdue diagnostic pathways.

At its core, the report is both an admission and a blueprint: an acknowledgment that the safety systems failed to capture complex, persistent harm and a plan to correct it.

The question now is straightforward.

Will the system act — or retreat?

Post Covid19 Vaccination Chronic Injuries Proposed Action Copy (1)

820KB ∙ PDF file

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FURTHER READING:

Is it long Covid or vaccine injury?

ACIP launches sweeping Covid-19 vaccine review under Retsef Levi

EXCLUSIVE: Retsef Levi unveils new members of his Covid vaccine work group

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For years, people who developed persistent health problems after Covid-19 vaccination struggled to be heard.

Many describe the same pattern: symptoms appearing soon after an injection — crushing fatigue, neurological problems, heart disturbances and immune disorders that disrupt daily life.

Yet when they sought medical help, their experiences were frequently dismissed. Some were told the symptoms must be anxiety. Others were told it was simply long Covid.

Throughout the pandemic, scientists poured enormous effort into understanding long Covid — the chronic illness that can follow a coronavirus infection. By contrast, illness reported after vaccination received far less systematic investigation.

Now a new peer-reviewed study suggests the two conditions may be distinguishable.

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In the years since the Covid pandemic, many people have been processing an experience that would have been difficult to imagine only a few years earlier.

Governments and health authorities exercised sweeping powers over personal medical decisions. Vaccine mandates have long existed in limited settings such as schools and certain healthcare workplaces.

But during the pandemic those mandates extended far beyond their traditional boundaries, reaching deeply into everyday social and economic life.

In many places, employers tied jobs to vaccination status, universities barred students from campuses and housing, and travel or access to public venues was made contingent on compliance.

Those who hesitated or declined often faced penalties. Some lost jobs, education, or professional standing. Doctors who questioned prevailing policies sometimes faced investigation, professional discipline, and in some cases lost their licences.

The experience left a lasting impression. People have not forgotten what happened, and it has changed how many now think about the limits of authority in medicine.

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A Washington Post opinion column attacking Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for questioning the sugar content of commercial drinks reveals how quickly public health debates can become political.

Kennedy proposed that companies selling drinks containing enormous quantities of sugar should be able to demonstrate that their products are safe.

In response, the editorial board of the Washington Post argued that this proposal represents an unacceptable intrusion on consumer freedom, in an article titled “In Defense of Sugar.”

But the issue is not personal freedom. It is industrial manipulation of our food supply with hidden sugar.

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A new study published in The BMJ is being cited as definitive proof that the HPV vaccine prevents cervical cancer.

Within hours of publication, headlines proclaimed that the vaccine provides strong and lasting protection. On social media, commentators circulated claims that widespread vaccination could virtually eliminate the disease.

The response was unsurprising. The BMJ is one of the world’s most influential medical journals, and research published in its pages is often treated by journalists, policymakers and clinicians as authoritative evidence.

That authority gives studies published in the journal enormous influence over how medical evidence is interpreted by the public.

The new paper analysed nationwide registry data from Sweden and reported that women vaccinated against HPV before age 17 had about an 80% lower risk of cervical cancer than those who were unvaccinated.

The finding quickly gained traction online. Alex Berenson, a journalist with a large following on X, wrote that the Swedish data were “very impressive” and said the study had convinced him that his own daughter should receive the HPV vaccine.

The paper soon began trending as commentators debated what the results meant.

But a careful reading of the study — including its supplementary material and its peer-review correspondence — reveals a far less convincing picture.

Several details buried in the analysis raise important questions about the claimed benefits.

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Last week, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) — the nation’s leading obstetrics body — withdrew as a liaison from the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).

ACOG said it was stepping away over concerns about ACIP’s credibility and invoked “scientific standards” to justify the move.

A newly appointed ACIP member is now turning that standard back on ACOG.

Dr Adam Urato, a Massachusetts obstetrician and long-time ACOG member, says ACOG’s own conduct during the Covid-19 pandemic warrants scrutiny — particularly its support for Covid-19 vaccination mandates in pregnancy.

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The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is not removing the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines from the market — and over the past year it has made that clear through both action and inaction.

In September last year, during a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), an FDA official said the agency would examine concerns about excessive residual DNA identified by independent researchers in mRNA vaccine vials.

That review has not been released.

The FDA also declined to add a black box warning to the products despite early indications that child deaths caused by Covid vaccination were being examined — a report the agency has yet to publish.

It has also delayed responding to a formal citizen petition calling for suspension of the mRNA Covid-19 injections, citing “the existence of other FDA priorities.”

The pattern is consistent. There has been no move toward suspension, restriction or withdrawal.

That position was reinforced this week when FDA Commissioner Dr Marty Makary said publicly that the agency “supports mRNA vaccines.”

But signs of a rift surfaced inside the federal advisory system last month.

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The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is now scheduled to meet March 18–19, according to an updated listing on the CDC website, following this month’s abrupt cancellation.

The February 25–27 meeting fell through when the required Federal Register notice was not published in time — an unusual lapse that quickly set off speculation in Washington and across public health circles.

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In January 2021, Israel secured early access to the Pfizer mRNA Covid-19 vaccine and launched a national campaign that moved faster than anywhere else in the world.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the World Economic Forum that Israel would act as “a world laboratory” — trading anonymised national health data for early vaccine supply.

The premise was clear: Israel would generate real-world evidence in real time.

That promise carried responsibility. If Israel was the global test case, its safety monitoring systems needed to function — and to be transparent.

Newly published research suggests that during the 2021 rollout to adolescents, cardiovascular reports were accumulating within a surveillance dataset but were not publicly analysed or discussed during the critical decision window.

That underlying data were only released following Freedom of Information requests.

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Something unsettling is happening inside America’s health agencies.

Policies are shifting, meetings are in limbo, decisions are being reversed and leadership posts are rotating, yet it is not entirely clear who is directing the movement.

Each development can be explained on its own, but taken together they raise reasonable questions about who is actually steering US health policy right now.

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