Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI)

Center for Science in the Public Interest

Center for Science in the Public Interest

Twenty-four prominent consumer, public health, and food allergy groups are today calling on the Trump administration to include alcohol in efforts to reduce chronic disease. The Center for Science in the Public Interest and other organizations wrote to Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent highlighting the impact of alcohol on the development of chronic disease in both children and adults.

The first half of 2025 has seen many changes in federal vaccine policy and programs. This list—published June 17, 2025, and drawn from news reports and other information—ranks the most significant changes to vaccination policy, with brief commentary from the editors. Editors’ note: The big news of this week continues to be Sec. Kennedy’s ongoing makeover of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP; #1).

In a major victory for public health, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts today struck down the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) directives that led to the cancellation of research grants based on sweeping, politically driven criteria. The court ruled that NIH’s actions targeting research involving disfavored topics and populations were unlawful, arbitrary and capricious, and therefore void.

Statement of CSPI Regulatory Counsel Jensen Jose With only days left in the legislative session, the New York Senate voted to advance the New York Food Safety and Chemical Disclosure Act (A1556E/S1239E), which requires companies to publicly disclose why they think their food chemicals are safe when they sneak new chemicals into the food supply without informing FDA. The bill would also ban three unsafe additives tied to cancer, hormone disruption, and reproductive toxicity.

As Regulatory Counsel, Jensen Jose focuses on supporting CSPI’s efforts to strengthen the oversight of food additives and dietary supplements. Prior experience Jensen served as regulatory policy specialist and staff liaison for the American Optometric Association. He also served as associate counsel for the US Department of Veterans Affairs, and a research associate for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

The first half of 2025 has seen many changes in federal vaccine policy and programs. This list—published June 12, 2025, and drawn from news reports and other information—ranks the most significant changes to vaccination policy, with brief commentary from the editors.

Fifty-five public health and medical organizations are calling on Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and U.S. Department of Agriculture Brooke Rollins to adopt the advice of the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee as their agencies finalize the final Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Former political appointees at the Department of Health and Human Services and career staff at the Food and Drug Administration, writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association today, say the FDA broke from its own long-standing practices when considering approval of the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine. Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine has been in wide use since 2022, when it was granted an emergency use authorization for those 12 and over in the midst of the pandemic.