The Department of Health and Human Services is canceling nearly $500 million in contracts for the development of messenger RNA vaccines in a controversial pivot away from a technology that delivered safe and effective COVID-19 shots in record time during the pandemic.

According to a Tuesday statement from HHS, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA, will terminate 22 mRNA projects in total, including contracts with Moderna, Pfizer and CSL Seqirus.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. falsely claimed, against the evidence of many clinical trials , that mRNA vaccines “fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu.”

Instead, Kennedy said in the statement, HHS will shift funding toward what he described as “safer, broade

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