NYT (gift link): Vaccine Makers Curtail Research and Cut Jobs

[DBoon]

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/health/rfk-vaccine-manufacturers.html?unlocked_article_code=1.MlA.-n-D.Ms-s4Y4e4MW5&smid=url-share

In Massachusetts, Moderna is pulling back on vaccine studies. In Texas, a small company canceled plans to build a factory that would have created new jobs manufacturing a technology used in vaccines. In San Diego, another manufacturing company laid off workers.

When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was picked in November 2024 to become the next health secretary, public health experts worried that the longtime vaccine skeptic would wreak havoc on the fragile business of vaccine development.

Those fears are beginning to come true, according to executives and investors involved with companies that develop and sell vaccines and the technology that is best known for the Covid vaccines.

At conferences and in interviews, they described the emerging consequences of the Trump administration’s dismantling of the longstanding federal support for vaccines.

[progressoid]

1. I am sad that I know people who think this is good.

During one "discussion," one person asked me in a raised voice, "do you know what they're doing to our MRNA?"

I responded, by asking her what mRNA was.

She said, "Well, it's magnetic RNA."