'Didn't really answer the question': CNN host highlights Trump official's non-answer
A top-ranking public health official changed the subject when CNN's Kate Bolduan asked him to comment on Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s past statements on vaccines.
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary appeared Wednesday morning on "CNN News Central," and Bolduan asked him to comment on new eligibility guidelines for vaccinations that had been reportedly keeping pregnant women from getting Covid shots.
"If this is the case, well, first of all, Kate, we've been very clear that anybody who wants a vaccine can get a vaccine," he said.
"They're not," Bolduan interjected. "They're not. You heard that from members of Congress. You heard that from, you've absolutely heard that from members of Congress when they even spoke to Robert Kennedy Jr. about that. You may want them to be able to get it if they want to, but because of the way the guidance has been rolled out and the way the recommendation has been pulled back, they are not able to either because pharmacists are afraid of liability or insurance is not covering it. It is not, if everybody wants it, they're not able to get it."
Makary once again insisted there were no barriers to patients receiving the shots, and he then tossed out a few red herrings and questioned whether they were safe and effective.
"Well, Kate, first of all, there is absolutely no regulatory barrier preventing somebody from getting it whatsoever," Makary said. "Now you can't get it at every Starbucks, but there is no rule that somebody cannot get it. What we have is a regulatory framework at the FDA that says we have to approve pharmaceutical claims based on the data that they presented to us, and so that's the standard. Now, some say we should just close our eyes and blindfold, blindly stamp, rubber stamp Covid vaccines in perpetuity every year without any updated clinical trial data."
The FDA commissioner then asked whether any healthy pregnant women had died from Covid in the past year and said administration officials were examining whether the vaccines had killed young people, and Bolduan challenged him on Kennedy's past statements on vaccines, in general.
"They do want they do want your leadership, absolutely, commissioner," she said. "FDA approves vaccines, the FDA is is is the gold standard in terms of approving vaccines, just as baseline. Since this is the topic, Secretary Kennedy, before he was secretary, had said that there's no vaccine that is safe and effective. Do you agree with that?"
Makary declined to answer directly but compared vaccines to the prescription medications advertised on television.
"Well, look, with every single medical product, I can just tell you as a physician, what we have to do is evaluate the safety to risk-benefit ratio," he said. "That is, every single product in all of medicine has some side-effect profile, and for some it's rare, and so that's the general framework, and that's what I think he was referring to."
The commissioner then changed the subject to pharmaceutical ads, saying the administration will now require ads to thoroughly list information related to all product risks, which Makary argued would lower drug prices and give consumers more data about medications, and CNN's host John Berman commented on his refusal to answer Bolduan's question.
"It's interesting," Berman said, as the segment ended. "His answer to the question about what Robert Kennedy said about vaccines, no vaccines being safe and effective, his answer was, we're trying to get rid of pharmaceutical ads. Didn’t really answer the question there."
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