Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to fire the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) entire vaccine board even as childhood vaccination rates drop is setting off alarm bells for the next school year.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of health and human services, appointed eight new members of an expert panel that advises the federal government on immunization policy, including several vocal vaccine critics and one who identifies as an “anti-vaxxer.

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said on Thursday he promised to allow U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy to pick a candidate for a key panel of vaccine advisers. Kennedy, who has a long history of questioning the safety of vaccines contrary to scientific evidence,