U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has ordered the termination of 22 federally funded mRNA vaccine projects, scrapping roughly $500 million in Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority contracts. The decision, announced 5 August, pauses government support for next-generation Covid-19 and flu shots and has been condemned by scientists and former officials who warn it could slow future pandemic responses and surrender leadership to China. The rollback is already curtailing work at companies such as Vaxart, which disclosed a second stop-work order on its $460.7 million Phase 2b trial of an oral Covid-19 vaccine. Although Vaxart’s candidate is protein-based, HHS linked the freeze to its wider review of mRNA spending, deepening industry uncertainty. Kennedy has also pressed journals to withdraw studies he says understate vaccine risks. On 11 August the Annals of Internal Medicine rejected his request to retract a Danish registry analysis of 1.2 million children that found no evidence aluminum adjuvants raise autoimmune, allergic or neurodevelopmental risks, saying there was “no reason for retraction.” The policy fight comes as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recovers from an 8 August attack in which a gunman angry about Covid vaccinations fired 180 rounds at the Atlanta headquarters, killing a police officer and shattering more than 150 windows before taking his own life. Kennedy toured the campus Monday but declined to cite vaccine misinformation as a motive, while new CDC Director Susan Monarez has pledged to bolster security after staff criticized a brief, glitch-plagued all-hands meeting on the shooting.