RFK Jr.’s CDC CANCELS Flu Shot Campaign, Major Vaccination Conference

Under the new leadership of HHS Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the CDC has scrapped their seasonal flu shot campaign.

Dubbed the “Wild to Mild” initiative, the ads were designed to get more people vaccinated against the flu.

However, staffers were recently informed that the whole campaign was being pulled, and information about it has now been removed from the CDC’s website.

RFK Jr. has also postponed a major vaccine advisory meeting, which was scheduled for February 26th and 28th.

There are no plans, at least as right now, to re-schedule the meeting.

Take a look at the details:

🚨BREAKING: The CDC which is now under the leadership of RFK Jr. has halted the flu shot campaign.

— Derrick Evans (@DerrickEvans4WV) February 22, 2025

RFK Jr. has officially canceled the CDC’s flu shot campaign.

I have only taken the flu shot once in the middle 90s, and it made me sick.

Do you support this? pic.twitter.com/na5pG81Yil

— Mrs Denosko🇺🇸 🌝 (@Denosko1) February 22, 2025

🔥 RFK Jr. just ended a CDC propaganda campaign to promote flu vaccines

The CDC ads “used animals as an analogy for the lowered threat of the flu virus … using the image of a kitten versus a lion.”

HHS also ordered CDC to “indefinitely postpone” meetings of its vaccine… pic.twitter.com/JxYT0U7D0d

— Holden Culotta (@Holden_Culotta) February 21, 2025

To be clear: flu shots are not being canceled.

Rather, the propaganda telling you that you should get yours is.

In case you’re curious, here’s what one of the CDC’s flu shot ads looked like:

I can’t help but wonder how much of our taxes went to making that…

More from The New York Post:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention killed a campaign promoting seasonal flu shots and canceled a major conference with virus experts just days after outspoken vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. became the nation’s top health official.

Under Kennedy’s leadership, the CDC pulled the plug on its “Wild to Mild initiative” —  which was aimed at encouraging high-risk folks to get vaxxed — Wednesday as one of worst flu seasons in decades rages, NPR reported.

The ads used animals as an analogy for the lowered threat of a the flu virus once a person is vaccinated — using the image of a kitten versus a lion.

ADVERTISEMENT

But CDC staffers were told in a meeting with National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases reps that the campaign would not continue, the outlet reported. Information about the campaign was then removed from CDC’s web page.

On Thursday, the HHS then ordered the CDC to indefinitely postpone a meeting of its vaccine advisory committee — which Kennedy has criticized in the past — slated for Feb. 26 and Feb. 28, The Washington Post reported.

Fortune added:

Yes, seasonal flu shots are still available, and no, it’s not too late to get yours. But you’d be forgiven for being confused, because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has halted one of its educational flu vaccine campaigns.

The agency’s Wild to Mild initiative, launched at the start of the 2023–24 flu season, aimed to inform the public that while getting immunized against the flu doesn’t guarantee you won’t catch an influenza virus, it can protect you from severe illness, hospitalization, and death. With the catchphrase “A flu vaccine can take flu from wild to mild,” the campaign’s marketing materials featured hulking, wild animals juxtaposed against domesticated, sometimes stuffed, counterparts, such as a blowfish versus a goldfish. Wild to Mild targeted high-risk groups in particular, including children and pregnant people, whose vaccination rates had suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The CDC, part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), ditched the campaign Feb. 19, as first reported by NPR. That is, six days after the Senate confirmed outspoken vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as President Donald Trump’s health secretary. National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases leaders broke the news to CDC staff following an HHS review of the campaign, NPR reported.