President Donald Trump's former surgeon general, Dr. Jerome Adams, has a stark warning about the potential ramifications of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. canceling funding for mRNA vaccine development.
"People are going to die because we're cutting short funding for this technology," Adams said in a CBS interview Aug. 10.
Adams served from 2017 through the end of Trump's first term, when the administration helped develop mRNA vaccines to combat COVID-19 through Operation Warp Speed. Adams described the initiative as Trump's greatest achievement "bar none" and said it's concerning that his administration is turning away from the mRNA technology.
Messenger RNA, or mRNA, is used in the two most common COVID-19 vaccines licensed in the United States. Adams, citing other experts, said it would've taken 18 to 24 months longer to develop the vaccines without the technology.
"By the most conservative estimates, at least 2 million lives were saved," Adams said. "Many people say that up to 20 million lives were saved because of the vaccines."
