Experts decry ‘neocolonialist’ Guinea-Bissau study after Trump administration changed advice for US babies

The Trump administration has indicated that it will fund a $1.6m study on hepatitis B vaccination of newborns in the west African country of Guinea-Bissau, where nearly one in five adults live with the virus – a move that researchers call “highly unethical” and “extremely risky”.

The news follows an official change in recommendations on hepatitis B vaccines at birth from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which called the shots an “individual” decision, despite decades of safe and effective vaccination and no evidence of harm. It is part of sweeping changes to childhood immunizations by the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, which have global repercussions – including cutting funding for programs that bring vaccines to countries around the world.

“He has a fixed, immutable belief that vaccines cause harm,” said Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center and an attending physician at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. “He will do everything he can to try and prove that.”