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# Panel Votes to End Newborn Hepatitis B Shot Recommendation
- URL: https://www.fdaweb.com/panel-votes-to-end-newborn-hepatitis-b-shot-recommendation/
- Published: 2025-12-05T12:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-14T15:28:24.000Z
- Author: David McFarland
- Tags: Biologics, #legacy-id-D5160335

CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) has voted 8 to 3 to discontinue the longstanding policy that all newborns receive the Hepatitis B vaccine within 24 hours of birth — a recommendation in place since 1991\. Under the new CDC guidance, only infants born to mothers with a positive or unknown hepatitis B status would be advised to get the vaccine at birth. For babies whose mothers tested negative, the decision would instead be left to parents and doctors, with a suggested earliest vaccination age of two months.

ACIP also voted to recommend that when evaluating the need for a subsequent hepatitis B vaccine dose in children, parents should consult with health care providers to decide whether to test antibody levels to hepatitis surface antigen to evaluate adequacy of protection through serology results.

The panel recommendation represent one of the most sweeping revisions to U.S. childhood immunization policy in decades. The current ACIP membership was selected earlier this year by HHS secretary **Robert F. Kennedy Jr.**, a known critic of conventional vaccine scheduling. A recommendation from ACIP becomes part of the CDC immunization schedule once it is adopted by the CDC director.

Meanwhile, public health groups reacted strongly to the ACIP recommendation. ““The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practice’s (ACIP) vote to weaken the birth-dose recommendation for the Hepatitis B vaccine is reckless and undermines decades of public confidence in a proven, lifesaving vaccine,” the American Medical Association said in a statement. “Today’s action is not based on scientific evidence, disregards data supporting the effectiveness of the Hepatitis B vaccine, and creates confusion for parents about how best to protect their newborns.”

“Delaying a birth dose of the safe and effective hepatitis B vaccine is senseless and will do real harm,” advocacy group Public Citizen said in a statement. “Fewer infants will be vaccinated against a potentially deadly disease, more people will likely be infected, and some will develop chronic hepatitis B infection and life-threatening liver disease. For 35 years, vaccination at birth has protected millions of newborns against a preventable disease, and the hepatitis vaccine has now become a victim of its own success. Upending a public health success because of baseless doubts about vaccine safety is a tragedy in the making.”