WASHINGTON — mRNA, a Nobel-winning know-how harnessed by Trump officers to create Covid photographs in document time, is turning into a political reject because the nation’s leaders brazenly embrace vaccine skepticism.
Republican lawmakers and federal well being officers alike are shunning messenger RNA, a primary constructing block of biology that proved its worth throughout Covid, and that holds promise for combating the following pandemic and unlocking new most cancers therapies. Public well being consultants and biotech firms are watching in horror as the federal government cuts its investments within the know-how, and as officers like well being secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. foment deep mistrust of mRNA vaccines.
On Wednesday, the Division of Well being and Human Providers confirmed it was canceling greater than $700 million value of contracts with Moderna to develop, check, and license mRNA vaccines for flu strains that might trigger future pandemics, together with the H5N1 fowl flu virus.
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