Four of the top medical leaders in Virginia have signed a letter opposing a vote last week by a Centers for Disease Control committee to end the agency’s recommendation for universal hepatitis B vaccines for all newborns at birth.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices now recommends “individual-based decision making” for infants born to mothers who test negative for hepatitis B. The vote means, according to the Health and Human Services website, that “parents and clinicians may decide together whether to administer the hepatitis B vaccine at birth or begin the series later in infancy,” and that if parents decide not to vaccinate at birth, that the vaccine series should be initiated at least two months after birth.

If the mother tests positive for hepatitis B or if their infected status is unknown, the CDC still recommends the infant should receive the vaccine within 12 hours of birth.

The signatories of the letter are:

•Eric Lowe, chair of the Department of Pediatrics at Eastern Virginia Medical School at Old Dominion University who also serves as the chief clinical academic officer at the Children’s Hospital of the King’s Daughters and a professor of Pediatric Hermatology/Oncology

•Madhu Misra, the chair of Pediatrics at the University of Virginia and the Physician-in-Chief at the UVA Health Children’s

•Cynthia Gibson, the chair of the Department of Pediatrics at Inova L.J. Murphy Children’s Hospital and an associate professor of medical education at the UVA School of Medicine

•Karen Hentricks-Muñoz, chair of Pediatrics at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine and the Physician-in-Chief of the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU

The letter was provided to The Virginian-Pilot this week.

They urge medical providers to follow the recommendation of the American Academy of Pediatrics, which advises all newborns to receive the hepatitis B vaccine.

“We want to reassure all families in Virginia that there has been no new or concerning information about the hepatitis B vaccine that prompted this new recommendation. We believe that changing the recommendation sends a confusing message to families with no evidence to support a concern of vaccine safety,” the letter reads. “The hepatitis B vaccine is one of the most studied vaccines in history with a very well-established safety and efficacy record.”

In the letter, the signatories warned that without being vaccinated at birth, up to 25% of infants who become chronically infected with hepatitis B will die prematurely due to liver cancer or cirrhosis. There is no cure for hepatitis B, and treating it involves lifelong use of antiviral medication, according to the letter.

The signatories also took aim at the CDC’s plan to rely on maternal testing alone to determine whether a newborn should receive the vaccine, saying this is ineffective “since transmission is not limited to mother to infant, many women receive little or no prenatal care, screening tests can be falsely negative, and infection can occur after testing.”

Lowe said in an interview with The Pilot that part of the reason they felt compelled to write the letter is because the effects of people not getting the hepatitis vaccine will not be seen quickly like it would if people stopped taking the measles or COVID vaccines, but rather in 20 or so years when cases of liver cancer dramatically increase. He said the medical community used to do things the way ACIP is now recommending, but the dramatic reduction in hepatitis B cases in the years since shows “there’s no reason to mess with it.”

“As pediatricians we wanted to support our general pediatricians who are giving the hepatitis B vaccine because every single one of them has a conversation with the family – none of the (vaccines) are given without consent, we already do all of that,” Lowe said.

“We understand that people are worried about side effects but we want to make sure that we compare them to the actual diseases as well … that the adverse affects of contracting hepatitis B at birth which is chronic hepatitis B and then potentially an early death from liver cancer or liver cirrhosis,” he continued.

He added that the American Academy of Pediatrics is just one of more than 40 other medical societies who have come out against the ACIP’s hepatitis B decision.

Hampton Roads medical providers contacted for this story did not provide comment by deadline Wednesday.

The hepatitis B vaccine has been recommended for all newborns since 1991 and over that time there’s been a reduction in annual infections from about 18,000 to about 20, CNN reported.

Hepatitis B is a condition in which a person’s liver becomes inflamed due to infection with the hepatitis B virus, which in some cases could lead to liver failure, cancer and death.

This is the latest rift in the medical community stemming from the CDC’s skeptical posture towards vaccines under the Trump Administration and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Kennedy removed all previous members of ACIP this summer and replaced them with his own selections.

In September, The Pilot reported that Sentara advised its providers not to administer the latest COVID-19 vaccine without a prescription ahead of a vote by ACIP on whether to recommend the 2025-26 vaccine. There was widespread confusion at major pharmacies across the country about whether to require a prescription, differing by state.

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