Supreme Court Turns Away COVID-19 Vaccine Appeals

 

U.S. Supreme Court justices on June 24 rejected appeals brought over COVID-19 vaccines by Children’s Health Defense (CHD), a nonprofit founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an independent candidate running for president.

 

The nation’s top court rejected an appeal seeking to overturn lower court rulings that said CHD and its members lacked standing to sue the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) over its emergency authorizations of COVID-19 vaccines for minors.

 

The justices also rebuffed another CHD appeal in a case that challenged the COVID-19 vaccine mandate imposed on students at Rutgers University, a public college in New Jersey.

The Supreme Court did not comment on either denial. It included them in a lengthy list dealing with dozens of cases.

Lawyers representing CHD, Rutgers, and the government did not return requests for comment.

 

In the FDA case, CHD and parents in Texas and Florida argued that the regulatory agency cleared COVID-19 vaccines under emergency authorization despite COVID-19 posing less risk than influenza to children, and without adequate clinical testing. The FDA also wrongly promoted the vaccines, the plaintiffs alleged.