Covid vaccine critic tapped to lead CDC advisory committee on shots

[Possible cure for Coronavirus concept, Covid 19 virus, vaccine vial on chalkboard]
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A task force formed within the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to discuss Covid-19 vaccines will be led by an MIT professor who has made derogatory remarks about the shots in the past.

While Retsef Levi was chosen in July to serve on the ACIP, he was recently elevated to lead the Covid task force within it, _The New York Times_ reported.

At the top of his page on X, Levi has pinned a video [https://x.com/RetsefL/status/1619945525670981632] of him warning of the dangers of mRNA vaccines. "The evidence is mounting and indisputable that MRNA vaccines cause serious harm including death, especially among young people," text along with the video reads. "We have to stop giving them immediately!"

Covid vaccines from Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA [https://seekingalpha.com/symbol/MRNA]) and Pfizer (NYSE:PFE [https://seekingalpha.com/symbol/PFE])/BioNTech (BNTX [https://seekingalpha.com/symbol/BNTX]) are mRNA-based.

"While individual members may hold initial personal views, the task force’s work will be guided by data, transparency, open-mindedness and open deliberation — not by any single opinion," HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon told [https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/22/health/covid-vaccines-rfk.html] the _Times_. "We are confident this process will produce policy recommendations that put patients’ health and safety first."

An ACIP page states [https://www.cdc.gov/acip/our-work/index.html#heading-uuf6nwjsay] that the Covid working group will discuss topics including the "risk-benefit and cost-benefit analyses of existing and newly FDA-authorized mRNA and other COVID-19 immunizations" and "identify critical gaps in the existing scientific and clinical knowledge and methodologies related to the safety and efficacy of the COVID-19 immunization."

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