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Stocks are down for vaccine makers like Pfizer and Moderna following President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head up the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Trump announced his pick on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday afternoon.
“The Safety and Health of all Americans is the most important role of any Administration, and HHS will play a big role in helping ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming Health Crisis in this Country,” he wrote in the tweet.
Pharma stocks fell shortly after the tweet went out, and continued to fall in after-market trading.
At 2pm Thursday, stocks for the mRNA vaccine giant Moderna were valued at nearly $41.33 a share. By Friday at noon, they had fallen to about $36.
Pharma giant Pfizer stocks dipped as well, from $26.53 at 2pm on Thursday before the announcement to $24.86 Friday at noon.
Kennedy told NBC News on November 6 that he is not “anti-vaccine,” though he has repeated a debunked claim that childhood vaccinations can cause autism, falsely called the Covid-19 vaccine “the deadliest vaccine ever made,” and founded Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit organization that has questioned the safety and evidence behind routine childhood vaccinations.
In a November 14 tweet thanking Trump for the nomination, Kennedy wrote that he would capitalize on this “generational opportunity” to end “the chronic disease epidemic.”“Together we will clean up corruption, stop the revolving door between industry and government, and return our health agencies to their rich tradition of gold-standard, evidence-based science. I will provide Americans with transparency and access to all the data so they can make informed choices for themselves and their families,” Kennedy wrote.