Childhood vaccines will remain covered by insurance plans despite recent recommendation changes issued by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, interim state insurance commissioner Josh Hershman confirmed in a statement Tuesday evening.
“Parents should be clear on this point: childhood vaccines remain covered by insurance in Connecticut, and nothing about the CDC’s recent announcement changes insurance coverage requirements for childhood vaccinations,” Hershman stated. “Families should continue to obtain vaccinations in consultation with their health care providers.”
On Monday, the CDC announced updates to its recommendations for childhood vaccines, which came after conducting an analysis of “how peer, developed nations structure their childhood vaccination schedules” at the request of President Donald Trump. The review found that the United States “recommended more childhood vaccine doses than any peer nation” and that “countries without vaccine mandates had as high immunization rates as the U.S.”
In response, the CDC issued a new, tiered recommendation, grouping childhood vaccines into three buckets: shots recommended for all children, those recommended for certain high-risk groups and those where decisions should be left up to “shared clinical decision-making,” or conversations between people and their doctors.
As of the end of 2024, the vaccine schedule recommended 17 immunizations for all children. The updated schedule broadly recommends just 11, including polio, whooping cough, measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox. Among the vaccines the CDC no longer recommends for all children are flu, hepatitis A and hepatitis B.
In a fact sheet published on Monday, the federal government clarified that, despite the recommendation changes, all vaccines would continue to be available to anyone who wants them through ACA plans, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program and the Vaccines for Children program.
“Families will not have to purchase them out of pocket. Among peer nations, the U.S. will continue to offer the most childhood vaccines for free to those who want them,” stated the fact sheet.
Hershman reiterated this message to Connecticut residents on Tuesday evening.
“The vaccines referenced in the CDC announcement were not removed from the immunization schedule. Instead, they were moved from a routine recommendation to clinical decision-making recommendation,” Hershman stated. “Because these vaccines remain on the CDC schedule, they continue to be covered by health insurance plans regulated by the CID.”
Department of Public Health Commissioner Manisha Juthani “is solely responsible” for determining Connecticut’s vaccine schedule, and the state’s recommendations for childhood vaccines will remain unchanged, a DPH spokesperson confirmed.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, Juthani said she had “serious concerns” about the CDC’s changes and said the move “risks creating confusion, placing more burden on parents and clinicians, and making preventive care harder to navigate.”
Juthani also addressed the federal government’s analysis comparing the U.S. vaccination schedule to peer nations.
“Other countries’ vaccine schedules reflect their own health systems and disease patterns, and a one-size-fits-another-country approach does not reflect the realities facing children in the United States,” Juthani stated.
Lawmakers have already started to discuss how Connecticut can address the uncertainty surrounding federal vaccine policy during the upcoming legislative session.
“Yesterday’s news was not surprising but absolutely shocking,” Public Health Committee co-chair Cristin McCarthy Vahey, D-Fairfield, said. “We will likely want to decouple ourselves from that federal guidance.”