“COVID-19 had a spillover effect,” Matt Motta, a health law and policy professor at Boston University’s school of public health, told HuffPost. Public health experts have repeatedly said there is no evidence to support delaying the hepatitis B vaccine for newborns. Using parental rights arguments to justify an anti-vax agenda is more proof that right-wingers see this as a winning strategy. As distrust in public health agencies increased, lawmakers introduced hundreds of bills targeting vaccine mandates, and the country’s partisan divide on vaccines and science grew. If Kennedy and parental rights activists have their way, outbreaks like these could become more common.

Source: Huffington Post December 10, 2025 22:26 UTC