Source: The Hill
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) no longer will require states to report childhood and adolescent immunization statuses as it explores “alternative immunization measures.”
In a December 30, 2025, memo to states, CMS Deputy Administrator Dan Brillman said his agency would remove four measures from its Core Sets, standardized healthcare measurements that states and CMS monitor to improve quality of care.
The four measurements that the CMS is removing from its Core Sets are Childhood Immunization Status; Prenatal Immunization Status: Age 21 and Older; Immunizations for Adolescents; and Prenatal Immunization Status: Under Age 21.
“Although not part of the Core Sets, states may voluntarily report on the results of these four Utilization Measures to CMS to allow CMS to maintain a longitudinal dataset while exploring alternative immunization measures,” Brillman’s memo stated. “The Childhood Immunization Status (CIS-CH) and Immunizations for Adolescents (IMA-CH) measures will be removed from 2026 mandatory stratification requirements.”
He wrote that in 2026, the CMS will look into options that “facilitate the development of new vaccine measures that capture information about whether parents and families were informed about vaccine choices, vaccine safety, and side effects, and alternative vaccine schedules.”
“CMS will also explore how religious exemptions for vaccinations can be accounted for in the data and the subsequent measure,” Brillman added.
The Department of Health and Human Services under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has moved to limit or reduce childhood vaccinations, with an advisory committee remade with experts sympathetic to his views voting last year to reduce who is eligible for certain childhood vaccines and delaying birth doses of hepatitis B vaccinations.
On January 5, CMS said it was reducing the number of vaccines it recommends for children.