CDC formally stops recommending hepatitis B vaccines for all newborns

Source: NBC News

Dec. 16, 2025, 6:34 PM EST


Instead of recommending the hepatitis B vaccine for all newborns, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now officially advises women who test negative for the virus to consult health care providers about whether their babies should get their first doses within 24 hours of birth.

The agency’s vaccine advisory committee — whose members Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appointed this year after he fired the previous ones — voted for the recommendation earlier this month, upending more than three decades of agency guidance. Acting CDC Director Jim O’Neill accepted the change on Tuesday — the final step for it to become the agency’s policy.

“We are restoring the balance of informed consent to parents whose newborns face little risk of contracting hepatitis B,” O'Neill said in a statement.

The CDC had recommended the birth dose of the vaccine since 1991. Many public health experts criticized the advisory committee’s decision: After the meeting, a chorus of doctors, political leaders and health officials called on O’Neill to ignore the suggested change and maintain the CDC’s recommendation, to no avail.

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/cdc-stops-recommending-hepatitis-b-vaccines-newborns-rcna248035