With flu vaccinations ramping up and COVID-19 shots starting to arrive after the Food and Drug Administration approved this year's updated versions, groups ranging from the American Academy of Pediatrics to the Infectious Diseases Society of America are banding together to provide advice that would normally come from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Kentucky Health Secretary Dr. Steven Stack called it a "tragedy" that clarity surrounding vaccinations has been replaced by confusion amid federal policy changes and mixed messaging from the Trump administration.
As for the doctors' groups releasing their guidance, Stack said those are the recommendations Kentucky will be looking to.
"So I'm grateful for and applaud the medical associations and a group called the Vaccine Integrity Project who have come together to create evidence-based vaccine recommendations. They have just recently announced ones for the fall respiratory illnesses, influenza, RSV, and COVID-19, and so those guidelines will be the ones that the Kentucky Department for Public Health recommends the public review," he said Thursday.
Stack also says he hopes the groups will release additional guidance on other routine vaccinations, as the country grapples with measles outbreaks that have driven overall case numbers to a 35-year high.