Trump signs order to reduce vaccines, split MMR

US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in the Oval Office on Monday calling for fewer recommended childhood vaccines and for the combined measles, mumps and rubella shot to be split, BBC News reported.

The order serves as guidance, not a mandate, because vaccines required for school attendance are set by states. It recommends reducing childhood vaccines to 11 from the 18 recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics, covering measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio, Haemophilus influenzae type B, pneumococcal disease, human papillomavirus and varicella, or chicken pox. It also calls for developing alternatives to aluminium in vaccines and testing whether they are safer and more effective.

Trump said his administration "is recognising gold standard childhood vaccine recommendations for only 11 core vaccinations against the most serious and dangerous diseases". He said, "We're reducing them," and said shots would be given over a series of doctor visits. He suggested the MMR vaccine could be "quite lethal" if given at once, compared it to pouring a bottle of soda into a child's body, and when asked for evidence said: "What I've heard is that there are some people that say it is that way."

The CDC says "most people who get MMR vaccine do not have any serious problems with it" and that getting the vaccine "is much safer than getting measles, mumps, or rubella". The agency says there is "no published scientific evidence that shows any benefit in separating the combination MMR vaccine into three individual shots". Multiple studies have found no link between MMR shots and autism, including a 2019 Denmark study of 657,461 children.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr said the proposed changes were meant to give parents choice, not prohibit access to childhood vaccines. Kennedy, who has sought to change and loosen vaccine regulations since taking office in 2025, told CNN the previous week that he had "never questioned the efficacy of the MMR vaccine". Dr Andrew Racine, president of the AAP, called the order "dangerous" and not based on "gold-standard science", while Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician who was the deciding vote to confirm Kennedy, called it "wrong" and wrote on X: "The President does not have the expertise to make these changes."

Experts say spacing out jabs leaves children more likely to contract diseases in the interim or to miss appointments when multiple visits are required. The CDC recommends two doses of the combined MMR vaccine, with the first at 12-15 months and the second between ages four and six. The AAP says there is no medical reason to delay or skip recommended immunisations and says studies have found no significant health risks from the tiny amounts of aluminium salts used in some vaccines.