‘This Move Is Going to Cost Lives’: Trump’s First Surgeon General Slams RFK Jr. Decision to Shut Down Vaccines

(Melissa Majchrzak/AP photo)

President Donald Trump’s former Surgeon General Jerome Adams rebuked the current administration on Wednesday over its decision to cancel almost half a billion dollars in federal contracts for the development of mRNA vaccines.

Adams, who was appointed by Trump in his first term in office, wrote on X that the decision was “going to cost lives.”

“I’ve tried to be objective & non-alarmist in response to current HHS actions – but quite frankly this move is going to cost lives. mRNA technology has uses that go far beyond vaccines… and the vaccine they helped develop in record time is credited with saving millions,” he wrote.

First developed by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, mRNA vaccines were used during the Covid-19 pandemic, where their quick development and adaptability became a fundamental part of fighting the virus. mRNA technology won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2023.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced in a statement Tuesday that it would be ending funding for 22 projects backed by the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), a key agency in the country’s biodefense infrastructure. The decision follows the administration’s revocation of a $600 million deal with Moderna in May, funding that was earmarked for the development of a potential bird flu vaccine.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a well documented vaccine skeptic, defended the move to cancel the mRNA projects in a video released on Tuesday.

“As the pandemic showed us, mRNA vaccines don’t perform well against viruses that infect the upper respiratory tract,” he said.

The collective response to the video was harsh and derisive from both sides of the aisle.

Adams has previously sounded the alarm about Kennedy’s actions at Health and Human Services. In June, Adams wrote that he was “deeply concerned” about the HHS Secretary’s decision to fire every member of the independent Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).

“This move risks undermining public trust in vaccines at a time when declining immunization rates and outbreaks of preventable diseases, like measles, warrant steady leadership,” he wrote.

His statement concluded: “Our children and communities deserve policies grounded in science, not politics and populism.”