Rep. Andy Harris (R., Md.) exposed the White House’s distorted claims about the influence sequestration will have on vaccines for children, former Washington Free Beacon staff writer Andrew Stiles reports.
Harris asked Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), during a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing Tuesday if the White House contacted him about how the sequestration will impact the availability of child vaccines. Frieden said,"I would have to get back to you on that."
In keeping with the administration’s campaign to scare the American public, the report claimed that thousands fewer children would receive vaccinations as a result of the cuts. In Harris’s home state of Maryland, the White House claimed that 2,050 fewer children would be vaccinated.
Harris then noted that the relevant federal program — known as the 317 Immunization Program — had its budget cut by $58 million in President Obama’s most recent budget request, a cut that was opposed by the National Association of County and City Health Officials. That figure is nearly double the amount that must now be cut under sequestration (about $30 million).
"Can I assume that the president’s proposed cut would have reduced funding to 4,100 children in Maryland?" Harris asked. Once again, Frieden said he would "have to get back to you on that," but ultimately suggested that CDC would have been able avoid reductions in child vaccinations under the president’s lower budget numbers, but not under the smaller cuts mandated by sequestration, which as Harris noted, is a "very interesting" claim.