Lauren
@laur705.bsky.social
Health Equity | MCH Research | Avid Traveler
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Lauren
@laur705.bsky.social
· Dec 10
Find Out Why Health Insurance Denied Your Claim
You likely have the right to access records that explain why your insurer denied your claim or prior authorization request. Use ProPublica’s free tool to generate a letter requesting your claim file f...
projects.propublica.org
Pro-Publica developed a tool to help you find out why your insurance claim was denied. I haven't tried this yet but would be interested to hear others experiences. 🩺 🛟
projects.propublica.org/claimfile/?u...
projects.propublica.org/claimfile/?u...
Reposted by Lauren
Read our full statement by AAP President Dr. Andrew Racine on today’s HHS announcement about the childhood immunization schedule: www.aap.org/en/news-room...
January 5, 2026 at 9:16 PM
Read our full statement by AAP President Dr. Andrew Racine on today’s HHS announcement about the childhood immunization schedule: www.aap.org/en/news-room...
Reposted by Lauren
the implications are beyond tragic.. kids will die. The US is not Denmark, it does not have universal healthcare.. meanwhile trust in public health will continue to be systematically undermined and eroded by RFK Jr and Co
Evidence and not bias and opinion should inform vaccine access- Kennedy and his acolytes have driven straight through the childhood vaccine schedule to recommend reducing ready access to many childhood vaccines
Kennedy Scales Back the Number of Vaccines Recommended for Children
www.nytimes.com
January 5, 2026 at 8:37 PM
the implications are beyond tragic.. kids will die. The US is not Denmark, it does not have universal healthcare.. meanwhile trust in public health will continue to be systematically undermined and eroded by RFK Jr and Co
Reposted by Lauren
1). The US is in the middle of the worst flu season in a decade.
2). Pertussis cases are the highest they have been in 20 years.
3). Measles has rebounded and elimination status has been lost.
RFK.Jr. has not recommended vaccination, instead he is aggressively rolling back vaccine policy.
2). Pertussis cases are the highest they have been in 20 years.
3). Measles has rebounded and elimination status has been lost.
RFK.Jr. has not recommended vaccination, instead he is aggressively rolling back vaccine policy.
January 5, 2026 at 8:42 PM
1). The US is in the middle of the worst flu season in a decade.
2). Pertussis cases are the highest they have been in 20 years.
3). Measles has rebounded and elimination status has been lost.
RFK.Jr. has not recommended vaccination, instead he is aggressively rolling back vaccine policy.
2). Pertussis cases are the highest they have been in 20 years.
3). Measles has rebounded and elimination status has been lost.
RFK.Jr. has not recommended vaccination, instead he is aggressively rolling back vaccine policy.
Reposted by Lauren
I can’t fully articulate the way my stomach dropped when I saw this headline. Please know the evidence has not changed. The people in charge have changed, and they did not consult any relevant experts or the public. “This new policy has not been vetted with pediatricians, the public, or the ACIP”
Federal health officials slash recommended childhood vaccinations under Trump’s directive
The number of recommended childhood shots drops from 17 to 11.
www.statnews.com
January 5, 2026 at 7:20 PM
I can’t fully articulate the way my stomach dropped when I saw this headline. Please know the evidence has not changed. The people in charge have changed, and they did not consult any relevant experts or the public. “This new policy has not been vetted with pediatricians, the public, or the ACIP”
Reposted by Lauren
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), run by Oz and his boss, RFK Jr., will no longer require physicians to report vaccination rates.
Instead, they plan to start having doctors report if they’ve discussed “alternative” vaccine schedules.
Instead, they plan to start having doctors report if they’ve discussed “alternative” vaccine schedules.
CMS to stop requiring states to report childhood vaccination levels
www.cidrap.umn.edu
January 4, 2026 at 10:37 PM
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), run by Oz and his boss, RFK Jr., will no longer require physicians to report vaccination rates.
Instead, they plan to start having doctors report if they’ve discussed “alternative” vaccine schedules.
Instead, they plan to start having doctors report if they’ve discussed “alternative” vaccine schedules.
Reposted by Lauren
1/ 2025 asked a lot of public health. We faced attacks on science. Budget cuts. Political pressure.
But despite all that, progress still happened. Every year, I take a moment to celebrate public health wins throughout the year. So without further ado, here are some amazing wins from 2025👇
But despite all that, progress still happened. Every year, I take a moment to celebrate public health wins throughout the year. So without further ado, here are some amazing wins from 2025👇
December 31, 2025 at 4:28 PM
1/ 2025 asked a lot of public health. We faced attacks on science. Budget cuts. Political pressure.
But despite all that, progress still happened. Every year, I take a moment to celebrate public health wins throughout the year. So without further ado, here are some amazing wins from 2025👇
But despite all that, progress still happened. Every year, I take a moment to celebrate public health wins throughout the year. So without further ado, here are some amazing wins from 2025👇
Reposted by Lauren
It is so embarrassing that this man has a license to practice medicine let alone being Director of the US FDA www.npr.org/sections/sho...
December 30, 2025 at 11:03 PM
It is so embarrassing that this man has a license to practice medicine let alone being Director of the US FDA www.npr.org/sections/sho...
Reposted by Lauren
I heard the Covid’s Wake authors speak at Johns Hopkins, and was genuinely amazed at how much of an alternate reality they were living in and what a poor grasp of scientific concepts they had (yes I am giving them the benefit of the doubt that it wasn’t totally disingenuous from start to finish.)
This is genuinely horrifying. Fact-free far-right agitprop given accolades by credible media across the political spectrum.
Congratulations to Stephen Macedo & Frances Lee, whose book In Covid's Wake has been recognized as:
⭐ A @newyorker.com Best Book of the Year
⭐ An @economist.com Book of the Year
⭐ A @wsj.com Best Book of the Year
Learn more about this eye-opening book: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
⭐ A @newyorker.com Best Book of the Year
⭐ An @economist.com Book of the Year
⭐ A @wsj.com Best Book of the Year
Learn more about this eye-opening book: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
December 26, 2025 at 8:24 PM
I heard the Covid’s Wake authors speak at Johns Hopkins, and was genuinely amazed at how much of an alternate reality they were living in and what a poor grasp of scientific concepts they had (yes I am giving them the benefit of the doubt that it wasn’t totally disingenuous from start to finish.)
Reposted by Lauren
Bari Weiss just sent this Christmas Eve email to the CBS News staff about "building trust," which includes her tripling down on spiking the CECOT piece "to make sure it's comprehensive and fair."
One CBS staffer tells me: "She really has no idea how insulting she comes across."
One CBS staffer tells me: "She really has no idea how insulting she comes across."
December 24, 2025 at 6:33 PM
Bari Weiss just sent this Christmas Eve email to the CBS News staff about "building trust," which includes her tripling down on spiking the CECOT piece "to make sure it's comprehensive and fair."
One CBS staffer tells me: "She really has no idea how insulting she comes across."
One CBS staffer tells me: "She really has no idea how insulting she comes across."
Reposted by Lauren
There's a lot of focus right now on a person's right to choose whether to be vaccinated. But the risks falling vaccination rates pose to individuals — especially young babies, the elderly & the immunocompromised — need to be part of that discussion. www.statnews.com/2025/12/23/v...
4 questions to understand the costs of ‘medical freedom’
The choice that one person makes not to vaccinate has real costs — financial and otherwise — for their neighbors.
www.statnews.com
December 23, 2025 at 2:19 PM
There's a lot of focus right now on a person's right to choose whether to be vaccinated. But the risks falling vaccination rates pose to individuals — especially young babies, the elderly & the immunocompromised — need to be part of that discussion. www.statnews.com/2025/12/23/v...
Reposted by Lauren
Here’s the highest-quality upload of the 60 minutes CECOT segment I’ve found so far:
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9w8gyi
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9w8gyi
Banned 60 minutes segment on CECOT
Dailymotion video by fond_.mhb423
www.dailymotion.com
December 23, 2025 at 12:07 AM
Here’s the highest-quality upload of the 60 minutes CECOT segment I’ve found so far:
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9w8gyi
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9w8gyi
Reposted by Lauren
It is utterly catastrophic that RFK Jr. plans to end CDC recommendations for most childhood vaccines.
It’s a betrayal of science, ethics, compassion, and the people of the United States.
And it was also a specific goal of Project 2025 (page 254).
It’s a betrayal of science, ethics, compassion, and the people of the United States.
And it was also a specific goal of Project 2025 (page 254).
December 20, 2025 at 12:50 AM
It is utterly catastrophic that RFK Jr. plans to end CDC recommendations for most childhood vaccines.
It’s a betrayal of science, ethics, compassion, and the people of the United States.
And it was also a specific goal of Project 2025 (page 254).
It’s a betrayal of science, ethics, compassion, and the people of the United States.
And it was also a specific goal of Project 2025 (page 254).
Reposted by Lauren
rfk will not rest until your kid is dead wapo.st/4s2l2zn
U.S. plans to stop recommending most childhood vaccines, defer to doctors
The plan, which is not finalized, suggests children get fewer shots and shifts to a model telling parents to consult doctors to make their own vaccine choices.
wapo.st
December 20, 2025 at 12:25 AM
rfk will not rest until your kid is dead wapo.st/4s2l2zn
Reposted by Lauren
Folks can submit comments opposing these transphobic proposed rules here:
The Department of Health and Human Services has proposed a new set of rules attempting to ban gender-affirming care for transgender youth nationwide.
Take action and tell HHS: No bans on gender-affirming care.
Take action and tell HHS: No bans on gender-affirming care.
Tell HHS: Hands Off Our Care
Take action with ACLU People Power!
act.aclu.org
December 20, 2025 at 12:15 AM
Folks can submit comments opposing these transphobic proposed rules here:
Reposted by Lauren
“A randomized trial withholding a proven, life-saving intervention from newborns would not be approved by an institutional review board in the United States or Europe. Ethical standards do not become optional because the participants are African.”
The planned hepatitis B birth-dose trial in Guinea-Bissau raises serious ethical concerns. Withholding a proven, life-saving vaccine from newborns to answer speculative questions is an absence of equipoise with real downstream harms for trust in vaccines.
bktitanji.substack.com/p/how-unethi...
bktitanji.substack.com/p/how-unethi...
How Unethical Research Seeds Medical Mistrust
The absence of equipoise can turn research into harm
bktitanji.substack.com
December 19, 2025 at 12:36 AM
“A randomized trial withholding a proven, life-saving intervention from newborns would not be approved by an institutional review board in the United States or Europe. Ethical standards do not become optional because the participants are African.”
Reposted by Lauren
AAP learned this week that seven grants to AAP under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services are being terminated. The sudden withdrawal of these funds will directly impact and potentially harm infants, children, youth, and their families.
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
December 17, 2025 at 11:34 PM
AAP learned this week that seven grants to AAP under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services are being terminated. The sudden withdrawal of these funds will directly impact and potentially harm infants, children, youth, and their families.
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
Reposted by Lauren
The "Make America Healthy Again" crowd is, once again, taking actions that harm Americans. Not only will this lead to higher rates of depression and suicidality for youth, it will impact those youth for the rest of their lives.
Trans youth deserve care
Trans youth deserve care
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is expected to announce a package of measures that would together ban gender-affirming care for minors. A press conference is set for 11 a.m. Thursday. n.pr/44xQKdD
RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz to announce moves to ban gender-affirming care for young people
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is expected to announce a package of measures that would together ban gender-affirming care for minors. A press conference is set for 11 a.m. Thursday.
n.pr
December 18, 2025 at 2:55 PM
The "Make America Healthy Again" crowd is, once again, taking actions that harm Americans. Not only will this lead to higher rates of depression and suicidality for youth, it will impact those youth for the rest of their lives.
Trans youth deserve care
Trans youth deserve care
Reposted by Lauren
This is horrific. RFK Jr’s CDC is funding a study in Guinea-Bissau which would involve deliberately withholding the hepatitis B vaccine from hundreds of newborn infants, putting them at great risk of death. They want to repeat Tuskegee.
CDC awards $1.6 million for hepatitis B vaccine study by controversial Danish researchers
www.cidrap.umn.edu
December 18, 2025 at 7:57 PM
This is horrific. RFK Jr’s CDC is funding a study in Guinea-Bissau which would involve deliberately withholding the hepatitis B vaccine from hundreds of newborn infants, putting them at great risk of death. They want to repeat Tuskegee.
"These policies and proposals misconstrue the current medical consensus and fail to reflect the realities of pediatric care and the needs of children and families," said AAP President Dr. Susan J. Kressly. 🩺🛟🧪
www.npr.org/sections/sho...
www.npr.org/sections/sho...
RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz announce moves to ban gender-affirming care for young people
The Trump administration Thursday proposed two rules targeting hospitals that treat transgender children and youth using Medicare and Medicaid as the lever. The move would affect trans youth who have ...
www.npr.org
December 18, 2025 at 11:54 PM
"These policies and proposals misconstrue the current medical consensus and fail to reflect the realities of pediatric care and the needs of children and families," said AAP President Dr. Susan J. Kressly. 🩺🛟🧪
www.npr.org/sections/sho...
www.npr.org/sections/sho...
Here's yet another issue where RFK is going to cherry-pick the data points that support his beliefs 🩺🛟
RFK Jr. blames pills—not guns—for school shootings
There is no credible evidence that antidepressants cause violence, but the health secretary now vows a “massive” effort to prove the failed theory.
www.motherjones.com
December 5, 2025 at 6:26 PM
Here's yet another issue where RFK is going to cherry-pick the data points that support his beliefs 🩺🛟
Reposted by Lauren
The decision by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to downgrade its recommendations to protect infants from hepatitis B is a dangerous move that will harm children.
Click here to read AAP's full statement: bit.ly/3Y9ZQJT
Click here to read AAP's full statement: bit.ly/3Y9ZQJT
December 5, 2025 at 4:15 PM
The decision by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to downgrade its recommendations to protect infants from hepatitis B is a dangerous move that will harm children.
Click here to read AAP's full statement: bit.ly/3Y9ZQJT
Click here to read AAP's full statement: bit.ly/3Y9ZQJT
Reposted by Lauren
A dystopian reality: unqualified decision makers with disregard for basic concepts in epidemiology, clinical medicine, and the evidence-to-decision guidelines process on full display at ACIP - leaving American children to bear the harm. (A few ACIP members excluded) www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/h...
Panel Votes to End Recommendation for Hepatitis B Shots for All Newborns
www.nytimes.com
December 5, 2025 at 4:58 PM
A dystopian reality: unqualified decision makers with disregard for basic concepts in epidemiology, clinical medicine, and the evidence-to-decision guidelines process on full display at ACIP - leaving American children to bear the harm. (A few ACIP members excluded) www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/h...
There are a lot of bad being done by this administration but the impacts of RFK's assault on public health will likely have the worst effects long term
December 4, 2025 at 7:51 PM
There are a lot of bad being done by this administration but the impacts of RFK's assault on public health will likely have the worst effects long term
Reposted by Lauren
We are watching white nationalism overrun public health in real time
Early in this ACIP meeting, Vicky Pebsworth blamed gay men, promiscuous women, urban residents, and immigrants for spreading HBV in the U.S.
Then Evelyn Griffin said, out loud, that “illegal immigrants” are to blame.
This committee should be DISBANDED and exiled to science Siberia.
Then Evelyn Griffin said, out loud, that “illegal immigrants” are to blame.
This committee should be DISBANDED and exiled to science Siberia.
December 4, 2025 at 6:52 PM
We are watching white nationalism overrun public health in real time
Reposted by Lauren
Two public letters this week — one from former FDA commissioners and one from former CDC leaders — warn that health leadership spearheaded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is putting the public’s health at risk with a haphazard approach to vaccine science.
Former FDA, CDC leaders warn that US vaccine policy is under threat - WSVN 7News | Miami News, Weather, Sports | Fort Lauderdale
(CNN) — Former US public health officials are sounding alarms about significant changes being made to the country’s vaccine policy under the Trump administration. Two publicRead More
wsvn.com
December 4, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Two public letters this week — one from former FDA commissioners and one from former CDC leaders — warn that health leadership spearheaded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is putting the public’s health at risk with a haphazard approach to vaccine science.