'She has no expertise': the US medical community girds for Tracy Beth Heg's tenure at the FDA

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Guardian

Wed 31 Dec 2025 09.00 EST
Last modified on Wed 31 Dec 2025 13.09 EST


As the US continues making unprecedented changes to its vaccination recommendations, one figure appears unexpectedly: Tracy Beth Høeg, a Danish American sports physician and epidemiologist who first made her name casting doubt on Covid vaccines in the pandemic and has focused upon possible deaths after Covid vaccination in her short tenure at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Health officials planned to announce radical changes to the childhood vaccine schedule earlier this month, aligning the US with Denmark’s immunization schedule, sources say – a major change that would put the US out of step with much of the world with no evidence for benefit. The announcement has been postponed until the new year.

Instead of Vinay Prasad, the top vaccines chief, Høeg is listed to speak at the event. She was recently named acting director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), the fifth person to lead the center this year.

The acting appointment of Høeg could signify a closer partnership between the drug and vaccine centers as Høeg and Prasad consolidate power at the agency – and it signals a greater focus upon dismantling already-approved vaccines at the FDA.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/31/tracy-beth-hoeg-fda-vaccines

[progree]

1. Meanwhile, flu cases are surging

Flu cases are surging and rates will likely get worse, new CDC data shows, NPR, 12/31/25

. . . Last week, more than 19,000 patients with influenza were admitted to hospitals, up about 10,000 from the previous week, according to new CDC data. To date, the CDC estimates at least 7.5 million people have been sickened, and over 3,100 people have died from the flu.

The surge seems to be driven primarily by a new strain of the virus — subclade K of influenza A(H3N2) — that emerged in Australia over the summer.

. . . ((speaking of this season's flu vaccine whose formulation was chosen last February before the problematic dominant strain causing the mayhem emerged --progree)) Preliminary data from the United Kingdom, which saw an early surge of flu this year, suggests the vaccine is about 30 to 40 percent effective at preventing hospitalization in adults. "Those numbers are in line with what you would typically see," says Krammer, though he stresses those are preliminary estimates. ((also reduces the spread -progree))

. . . in the U.S., only 42 percent of adults have gotten a flu shot this year.

. . . "If you're using public transportation, if you're in the room with a lot of other people, if you're in a healthcare setting, it's really smart to wear a mask,"

More: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/12/30/npr-flu-cdc-health

In the article, there are remarks from Demetre Daskalakis, who led the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at CDC until he resigned in August, about the relative lack of communications from the CDC urging people to get the vax. And the CDC's laughable response.

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