US Health Department Pulls Back on Funding mRNA Vaccine Research

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Bloomberg

August 5, 2025 at 6:04 PM EDT


The US Department of Health and Human Services is ending contracts to develop vaccines using messenger RNA technology, another step in the agency’s changing practices toward vaccines under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The agency is terminating 22 contracts worth almost $500 million, according to a statement Tuesday.

The move comes as Kennedy faces criticism from some of his supporters who are upset that the Food and Drug Administration has continued to approve mRNA vaccines. Though the agency has limited their use for some healthy children and required additional studies in other cases, some vaccine critics backing Kennedy want the shots pulled off the market entirely.

HHS described the move as a “coordinated wind-down” of mRNA vaccine projects under the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA. Kennedy asserted that the vaccine projects being discontinued “fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu.”

Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-08-05/us-health-department-pulls-back-on-funding-mrna-vaccine-research

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Link to HHS PRESS RELEASE - HHS Winds Down mRNA Vaccine Development Under BARDA

Link to tweet

Secretary Kennedy
@SecKennedy
·
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We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted. BARDA is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development investments because the data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu. We’re shifting that funding toward Show more
5:55 PM · Aug 5, 2025

You didn't listen to any "experts". You listened to the quacks.

[chowder66]

1. I hope he's coughed on by a thousand Covid carriers.

Fucking bastard.

[applegrove]

2. Pants on fire.

[underpants]

3. Policy from a conspiracy theory. The mRNA vaccines are an incredible achievement in a short period of time

The Human Genome project was published in 2003.

Instead of having to handle, create an exact dosage, transport, and administer a live virus the body gets instructions to synthesize a protein that it learns to fight. The instructions are discarded like IKEA instructions.

This is so stupid.

https://www.cdc.gov/covid/vaccines/how-they-work.html

[bluestarone]

4. This has to be stopped, before

He kills millions of elderly.

[bmichaelh]

5. Cancer Vaccines

Some of it is being used in development for cancer vaccines.

It is being used in trials for pancreatic cancer.

It is not just being used for COVID.

I am a lymphoma survivor and my oncologist has told me that one day mRNA vaccine could be used for that; not in the land of Jonas Salk.

https://www.rawstory.com/robert-f-kennedy-jr-2673861994/

[travelingthrulife]

15. Yup. They designers envisioned vaccines that could carry the necessary instructions to

cells to combat cancers or other diseases in the future.

All because vaccine nuts insisted those of us taking the covid vaccine would be dead in 5 years or sprouting extra heads or something.

[SunSeeker]

6. K & R for exposure of idiotic decision that will let millions die needlessly.

[slightlv]

7. And there were some trials going on in pain management

under certain conditions, especially in conjunction with autoimmune diseases. We really have so little research done on the AutoImmune syndrome on the whole... only on certain diseases. Many of us have been waiting for research to pan out to have hope of controlling our pain and other debilitating symptoms in new ways, hoping once again to begin "living life fully" instead of just "existing."

We are going backwards so fast on so many things in this country, I dread to think where we'll end up. Medicine such as that which my great-great grandmother used in Ireland (herbs and salves) may be all we have to depend on once again one BKjr gets done with us. And then a whole new "witch finding" era could begin by those using the "magical" cures.

[PSPS]

8. "You listened to the quacks."

Bob IS a quack.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. And birds of a feather...

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

9. Assholes want to kill more Americans

[bmichaelh]

11. Wrong Legacy

Trump could have pursued a new legacy but has decided to pursue a legacy of MAHA.

40% of COVID deaths during Trump's first term could have been averted.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/10/us-coronavirus-response-donald-trump-health-policy

Using mRNA vaccines for pancreatic cancer has shown some promise:

https://www.mskcc.org/news/can-mrna-vaccines-fight-pancreatic-cancer-msk-clinical-researchers-are-trying-find-out

It might be used for other cancers as well.

The MAHA movement will not cure cancer.

Trump has hired quacks who are part of this movement.

There are stories Trump calls RFK Jr multiple times each week wanted to know why people are not healthier.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rfk-jr-donald-trump-calls_n_6891be81e4b06ab338943c47

[mahatmakanejeeves]

12. "We've discovered a literal miracle with almost unlimited potential and it's being scrapped for *no reason whatsoever*"

Reposted by Kevin M. Kruse
https://bsky.app/profile/kevinmkruse.bsky.social

David Slack
‪@slack2thefuture.bsky.social‬

Follow
Well, not “no reason.”

The reason is that a spoiled rich heroin addict who eats roadkill and killed 83 people in Samoa just isn’t buying the *science* — so now your meemaw has to die.

See how simple that is?

‪George Pearkes‬
‪@peark.es‬
· 11h
We’ve discovered a literal miracle with almost unlimited potential and it’s being scrapped for *no reason whatsoever*. This isn’t even nihilism, it’s outright worship of death and human suffering.
August 5, 2025 at 7:55 PM

Well, not “no reason.”

The reason is that a spoiled rich heroin addict who eats roadkill and killed 83 people in Samoa just isn’t buying the *science* — so now your meemaw has to die.

See how simple that is?

— David Slack (@slack2thefuture.bsky.social) 2025-08-05T23:55:18.030Z

[ProudMNDemocrat]

13. The Senior Living Facility where I live opened up in November of 2019.

When COVID hit as early as Mid March of 2020, residents here were shuttered in their apartments. Meals were delivered to them by staff for an additional $125 each a month for luncheon and supper of what was offered on the menu that day. All Activities were suspended until late September. Mask wearing was MANDATORY when outside of the apartment to go to Medical appointments, etc. Some of the stories I heard were terrible. Isolation was the norm and many were lonely, especially the ones in Assisted Living and Memory Care.

My husband and I moved in September of 2022. There have been some outbreaks of COVID come through, but not serious enough to warrant being shuttered in one's apartment for any length of time like months rather than 5 to 7 days. The vaccinations for COVID, Flu, RSV, Pneumonia, have been helpful. I plan to get all my shots before November when I take my trip to see friends down in Georgia for 12 days.

RFK Jr, is one sick puppy.

[travelingthrulife]

14. Right when we are on the brink of finding a cancer vaccine and vaccines for

other diseases using mRNA.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

16. Ignoring scientists' pleas, RFK Jr. slashes investments in mRNA vaccines

Remember when Donald Trump celebrated mRNA-based vaccines as a “modern-day miracle”? That was before Robert F. Kennedy Jr. got to work.

That an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is behaving like an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is painfully predictable.

But the fact remains that 52 Senate Republicans were given an opportunity to protect Americans from RFK Jr. — and they failed spectacularly.

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-08-06T14:05:48.038Z

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/ignoring-scientists-pleas-rfk-jr-slashes-investments-mrna-vaccines-rcna223349

When senators were considering Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, they were told not to worry too much about his radicalism. Sure, RFK Jr. had a record of promoting bizarre and unscientific ideas, but once in office, the argument went, his ambitions would be limited......

In the weeks and months that followed, Kennedy did exactly what his critics said he’d do, gutting key parts of the nation’s public health infrastructure, while targeting vaccines and public access to them. As NBC News reported, those efforts are ongoing.

The Trump administration is terminating 22 contracts focused on developing mRNA vaccines and winding down additional federal investments in mRNA technology, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Tuesday. Many scientists and infectious disease experts swiftly denounced the move as a broadside on an area of research seen as particularly promising after its use in rapidly developing Covid vaccines.

NBC News’ report went on to note that the targeted projects were funded by the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), an HHS program that works with the pharmaceutical industry to develop vaccines and other countermeasures for public health emergencies......

A related Times report published in May added, “To scientists who study it, mRNA is a miracle molecule. The vaccines that harnessed it against Covid saved an estimated 20 million lives, a rapid development that was recognized with a Nobel Prize. Clinical trials show mRNA-based vaccines increasing survival in patients with pancreatic and other deadly cancers. Biotechnology companies are investing in the promise of mRNA therapies to treat and even cure a host of genetic and chronic diseases, including Type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis.”....

But as unsettling as these developments are, none of what’s transpired at HHS in recent months is surprising. Kennedy’s anti-science reputation was well established long before Trump nominated him. That an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is behaving like an unqualified, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is painfully predictable.

The fact remains, however, that 52 Senate Republicans were given an opportunity to protect Americans from Kennedy — and they failed spectacularly. The more steps that Kennedy takes to put people at risk, the more GOP senators bear responsibility for his radical and dangerous decisions.

[bmichaelh]

17. Life expectancy

RFK Jr and Trump do not ask the hard questions: Why is life expectancy in EU countries and higher than the US?

In some cases by almost 5 years.

MAHA will not answer that question.