Trump vaccine order faces hurdles over logistics, cost, expert criticism

President Donald Trump's executive order mandating the separation of childhood vaccines into individual shots and spacing them out has drawn sharp criticism from public health experts. The order, signed Monday, calls for unbundling combination vaccines like the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) shot and administering them separately over longer periods.

Experts argue there is no scientific basis for this change. Dr. Anna Durbin of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health stated, "There is no good justification for this. I think it's very bad public health policy." Combination vaccines have been shown to increase the likelihood of children being fully protected before starting school.

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We do things that are less convenient and more expensive if there's a good reason to do it. There is no good justification for this. I think it's very bad public health policy.

The biggest hurdles appear to be the unprecedented financial and logistical demands. Drugmakers would need to revive individual vaccines not widely used in decades and build new manufacturing plants, a process experts estimate could take years and cost tens of millions of dollars. Parents would face more frequent doctor visits, straining pediatricians and increasing costs for supplies.

Federal officials have 90 days to develop plans for these changes. However, pharmaceutical scientists and former regulators believe the overhaul would be a lengthy and costly undertaking. Currently, no individual vaccines for measles, mumps, or rubella exist in the U.S.; only combination shots have been approved since the 1970s. Former FDA vaccine chief Dr. Jesse Goodman noted that companies might need to conduct extensive studies to prove the efficacy of new individual shots, raising questions about FDA approval.

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The question is how much has changed since then and how comfortable will the FDA and the companies be relying on those comparisons?