Trump proposes splitting childhood vaccines into five doses; experts say plan would render them ineffective

On Friday, President Donald Trump announced that his administration plans to recommend breaking up certain childhood vaccines into five separate injections, each containing one-fifth of the standard dose, spaced six months apart over a period of two and a half years. "Instead of a child going in and having a tremendous amount of different vaccines pumped into a big proportion of the body," Trump said, "we're going to recommend that they do five doses marked one, two, three, four, five and that they be given in six-month intervals, so that a small amount of the vaccine gets pumped into the body."

The proposal is part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to reshape how the federal government approaches childhood immunization. In August, Trump signed an executive order directing that infants receive fewer vaccines over an extended timeline and that the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine be separated into three individual shots. Trump has long claimed that children receive dangerously large volumes of vaccine material—he has previously suggested the amount is "the size of a bottle of soda." The actual dose of MMR vaccine given to children around 12 months of age is 0.5 milliliters, roughly one-tenth of a teaspoon.

Trump also suggested that certain vaccines have been removed from the childhood schedule because they are not needed until children are older, an apparent reference to the federal immunization schedule. His administration attempted to overhaul that schedule earlier this year, but the effort was temporarily blocked by a federal judge. Trump specifically praised the polio vaccine as "amazing" but did not clarify which other vaccines he intended to modify. He also claimed that the schedule changes would lead to a "massive reduction in autism," despite decades of extensive scientific research finding no connection between vaccines and autism.

Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and an inventor of a rotavirus vaccine, called the proposal "buffoonery." He explained that vaccine dosing schedules are determined through rigorous scientific study designed to deliver the minimum amount of vaccine needed to trigger a protective immune response. Reducing the dose below that threshold would simply render the vaccines ineffective. "What he's suggesting would not work," Offit told CNN. "He's basically saying he wants to give vaccines in a manner in which they wouldn't be protective." Splitting doses would also provide no safety benefit, Offit emphasized, since vaccines do not overwhelm children's immune systems. He noted that children's bodies generate a billion new immune cells daily to manage the viruses and bacteria they encounter naturally—vaccines represent only a tiny fraction of that daily immune challenge.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who stood beside Trump as he outlined the plan, has been a prominent figure in vaccine skepticism. On Thursday, Kennedy delivered the keynote address at a conference held by Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine advocacy organization, where he received a standing ovation. He told attendees that they have "a strong and steadfast friend at the White House" and pledged to "stay in this fight." The Department of Health and Human Services has not provided additional details about how the administration intends to implement the proposal or which vaccines would be affected. The plan now faces the same legal and scientific scrutiny that blocked the administration's earlier attempt to overhaul the federal vaccine schedule.