Frontline Blog
New HHS vaccine schedule risks confusion, distrust, and preventable disease
January 2026
“The Big Cities Health Coalition (BCHC) is profoundly concerned by the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) decision to overhaul the recommended childhood vaccination schedule.
“Our members lead the country’s largest, urban local health departments and care deeply about the 61 million Americans they serve. Our members do everything they can to ensure children and families are as healthy and safe as possible. That includes vaccination, which prevents unnecessary disease and death, especially during respiratory virus season.
“This announcement makes their job that much harder. Changing the schedule now, without debate or new scientific evidence, is designed to deepen confusion, erode trust, and further lower vaccination rates. It reinforces a dangerous trend in which political ideology, not science, shapes decisions about which vaccines children should receive.
We will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that those who live in our jurisdictions continue to have access to vaccines that protect their health and save lives.
“We at BCHC and our members have no intention of following that dangerous trend. We will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that those who live in our jurisdictions continue to have access to vaccines that protect their health and save lives.
“Reclassifying long-standing vaccine recommendations without any reputable evidence to justify those changes is political theater, not science. Families have always discussed recommended vaccine schedules with their health care providers or public health experts. This change unnecessarily interferes with those conversations and intentionally breeds ambiguity about when and why vaccines are recommended, which further undermines confidence.
“In just the last three decades, recommended vaccines have saved the lives of more than 1 million children and have protected 500 million more kids from contracting preventable diseases. The families our members serve demand the best information and care that science and public health can provide. Regardless of this dangerous new direction, BCHC members will continue to do right by the communities they are proud to serve.”
