A Utah-based plastic surgeon appears to be off the hook for federal charges over an alleged COVID-19 vaccine fraud scheme, in which he and three of his associates were accused of providing fraudulent COVID-19 vaccination cards at $50 a pop while squirting the corresponding vaccines down the drain—wasting roughly $28,000 worth of federally provided, lifesaving vaccines. In cases where parents brought in children for fake immunizations, the group would allegedly inject saline solutions at the parents' request to make the children believe they had received vaccinations.

In total, the group was accused of wasting 1,937 COVID-19 vaccine doses between October 2021 and September 2022, including 391 pediatric doses, and creating fraudulent immunization records for them. The alleged scheme netted them nearly $97,000.

The charges were filed in January 2023 under the Biden administration after two separate undercover agents went through the scheme to get a fake vaccination card. The plastic surgeon, Michael Kirk Moore Jr., who owns and operates Plastic Surgery Institute of Utah in Midvale, south of Salt Lake City, as well as the business' office manager, Kari Dee Burgoyne, its receptionist, Sandra Flores, and Moore's neighbor, Kristin Jackson Andersen, were charged in the case. All four people faced charges of conspiracy to defraud the federal government, along with two counts related to improper disposal of government property.

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All 17 experts ousted from the federal vaccine advisory committee have spoken out about the drastic changes that anti-vaccine advocate and current US health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made since taking office. Those changes include unilaterally restricting access to COVID-19 vaccines and summarily firing the entire Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which had guided federal vaccine policies for more than 60 years.

"We are deeply concerned that these destabilizing decisions, made without clear rationale, may roll back the achievements of US immunization policy, impact people’s access to lifesaving vaccines, and ultimately put US families at risk of dangerous and preventable illnesses," the fired experts write in an editorial published in JAMA.

Kennedy dismissed the entire committee on June 9, accusing the former members of lacking public trust and being "plagued with persistent conflicts of interest," despite the committee's transparent disclosure and conflict of interest policies.

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Oncologist Vinay Prasad, a divisive critic of COVID-19 responses, will be the next top vaccine regulator at the Food and Drug Administration, agency Commissioner Martin Makary announced on social media Tuesday.

Prasad will head the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), which is in charge of approving and regulating vaccines and other biologics products, such as gene therapies and blood products.

"Dr. Prasad brings the kind of scientific rigor, independence, and transparency we need at CBER—a significant step forward," Makary wrote on social media.

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Under President Trump, the Food and Drug Administration may no longer approve seasonal COVID-19 vaccines updated for the virus variants circulating that year, according to recent statements by Trump administration officials.

Since the acute phase of the pandemic, vaccine manufacturers have been subtly updating COVID-19 shots annually to precisely target the molecular signatures of the newest virus variants, which continually evolve to evade our immune responses. So far, the FDA has treated these tweaked vaccines the same way it treats seasonal flu shots, which have long been updated annually to match currently circulating strains of flu viruses.

The FDA does not consider seasonal flu shots brand-new vaccines. Rather, they're just slightly altered versions of the approved vaccines. As such, the regulator does not require companies to conduct lengthy, expensive vaccine trials to prove that each slightly changed version is safe and effective. If they did, generating annual vaccines would be virtually impossible. Each year, from late February to early March, the FDA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization direct flu shot makers on what tweaks they should make to shots for the upcoming flu season. That gives manufacturers just enough time to develop tweaks and start manufacturing massive supplies of doses in time for the start of the flu season.

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