President Donald Trump has ordered agencies to take heed of a government document that outlines how the United States recommends more vaccines than other countries.

The May 29 executive order also directs the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and its advisory panel on vaccines, to take action.

Here’s what to know about the order.

‘Guiding Resource’

Trump called the document, a scientific assessment authored by two government scientists, “a guiding resource for the Federal Government.” He said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the CDC’s advisory panel on vaccines, known as ACIP, must review the assessment and recent clinical data and “to the extent permitted by law, take any appropriate steps to update the United States childhood and adolescent vaccine schedule.”

The review “should consider ways to provide maximum flexibility to parents and doctors through recommendations for timing and sequencing of the administration of routine immunizations,” the president added.

Trump also told all federal agencies to make sure their actions and funding align with the CDC’s vaccine schedule, “including fulfilling all legal obligations with respect to parental authority, religious freedom, disability accommodations, and equal protection under the law.”

The assessment determined that certain vaccines the United States recommends for children, including against influenza, are not widely recommended by peer nations.

In January, the acting director of the CDC at the time cited the document and said the CDC would only broadly recommend eight vaccines, down from 14. The shift, backed by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., impacted vaccines against COVID-19, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, influenza, meningococcal disease, and rotavirus.

Response to Ruling?

The American Academy of Pediatrics, which receives funding from vaccine manufacturers, and other groups challenged the January changes. A federal judge blocked the changes in March, ruling that the CDC had not taken necessary steps, such as consulting its vaccine advisory panel, before making the update. An appeal is pending.

“The new Executive Order appears designed to sidestep that challenge,” Dr. Robert Malone, a former member of the CDC’s advisory panel, wrote on his blog.

Malone said that the order shifted the authority to update vaccine guidance from a voluntary advisory committee and executive agencies to elected officials.

“It is part of a broader effort to reassert democratic oversight over a public health bureaucracy that many Americans have come to view as too closely aligned with industry interests and too insulated from scrutiny,” he said.

The Department of Health and Human Services, the CDC’s parent agency, referred The Epoch Times to the White House, which declined to answer questions about the order, including whether it was in response to the judge’s ruling. A lawyer representing plaintiffs in the case did not return a request for comment by the time of publication.

Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, who resigned from the CDC in 2025, said on X that he believed the order amounted to political posturing, saying there is “no current impact on coverage or recommendations (that could change).”

“It says the ACIP should do what ACIP does with an added pinch of Denmark on the side to appease the Kennedy crew. Tedious games,” he said.

 Assessment

Trump in 2025 ordered health officials to look at vaccine practices in other nations “and, if they determine that those best practices are superior to current domestic recommendations, update the United States core childhood vaccine schedule to align with such scientific evidence and best practices.”

Martin Kulldorff, an epidemiologist and senior Department of Health and Human Services scientist, and Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg, a top Food and Drug Administration official at the time, said in the January assessment that prompted the CDC to narrow recommendations for six vaccines that those vaccines would still be available for children deemed high-risk. They added that aligning the CDC schedule for children with peer nations would reform and restore trust in public health, noting polls that found trust in doctors and hospitals has declined in recent years.

In a fact sheet accompanying Trump’s new order, the White House said the assessment “found that the United States currently recommends more childhood vaccines than any peer nation, including more than twice as many vaccine doses as some European nations, and identified a set of consensus vaccines that are consistently recommended in all peer countries.” The assessment also highlighted how most peer nations achieve high vaccination rates without mandates, officials noted.

“By signing today’s Executive Order, President Trump is reaffirming his commitment to gold-standard science, ensuring Americans receive the best possible medical advice, and empowering patients and doctors with maximum flexibility,” the White House said.

“I am very happy to see this work recognized and endorsed by President Trump,” Hoeg told The Epoch Times in an email. “However, the timing of it is odd because I was abruptly fired just 2 weeks ago after over 13 months at the FDA for reasons that remain unclear to me.”

Hoeg said she was pressured to resign, but declined, prompting her termination.

Hoeg’s firing came after the departures of Dr. Marty Makary, who had been the FDA’s commissioner, and Dr. Vinay Prasad, who had headed the FDA’s vaccine division and who had partnered on multiple papers in the past with both Hoeg and Makary.

The FDA did not respond to a request for comment on Hoeg’s firing, and the White House declined to say why she was fired.