WASHINGTON, DC: U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testifies before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions on Capitol Hill.(Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images) Getty Images

Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., announced yesterday that the federal government’s emergency preparedness agency, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, will no longer fund work on messenger RNA vaccines.

BARDA is terminating 22 grants supporting development of mRNA vaccines, worth a total of $500 million. The agency’s ending of new federal investments in mRNA technology was presaged earlier this year by substantial cuts imposed by the Department of HHS when it terminated dozens of mRNA-related research projects .

See Full Page