The CDC has moved to abandon recommending hepatitis B vaccines for newborns in an 8-3 vote on Friday by its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).

The news comes after Gov. Maura Healey and officials from the Department of Public Health slammed the Health & Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in a Wednesday press conference for his push to see if there is a link between childhood vaccines and autism. Healey blasted Kennedy and the ACIP committee, calling the Friday vote “dangerous and wrong.”

“This is about the health and safety of our children. The hepatitis B vaccine is safe, effective and lifesaving. It has been recommended for newborns since 1991 and has resulted in a 99% decrease in pediatric infection rates. This vote by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s handpicked advisers is dangerous and wrong,” Healey said in a written statement.

“I want the people of Massachusetts to know that your state Department of Public Health – led by an actual doctor and guided by science and data – continues to recommend that newborns receive the hepatitis B vaccine. We are going to continue to work with other states to ensure that all of our residents can receive the vaccines they need and want to keep them and their children healthy,” she said.

HHS Communications Director Andrew Nixon referred the Herald to a press release from the department, which explained that if approved by Deputy HHS Secretary and Acting Director Jim O’Neil, it would recommend individual-based decision-making for parents deciding whether to give the hepatitis B vaccine birth dose to infants born to women who test negative for the virus.

“The American people have benefited from the committee’s well-informed, rigorous discussion about the appropriateness of a vaccination in the first few hours of life,” said Director O’Neil.

For infants not receiving the birth dose, ACIP suggested in its recommendation that the initial dose be administered no earlier than two months of age.

“Individual-based decision-making, known on the CDC immunization schedules as shared clinical decision-making, means that parents and health care providers should consider vaccine benefits, vaccine risks, and infection risks, and that parents consult with their health care provider and decide when or if their child will begin the hepatitis B vaccine series,” HHS explained it its press release.

“Parents and health care providers should consider whether there are infection risks such as a household member who has hepatitis B or frequent contact with persons who have emigrated from areas where hepatitis B is common,” it said.

DPH Commissioner Dr. Robert Goldstein, who spoke out against Kennedy and the CDC with Healey on Wednesday, labeled the move to abandon the longstanding recommendation as “reckless.”

“As an infectious disease physician, I cannot overstate how reckless this move is. Removing the newborn hepatitis B vaccine from the routine schedule is a decision driven by ideology – not science – and it ignores decades of irrefutable evidence that this dose saves lives. For more than three decades, the birth dose has been one of the safest, most effective, and most powerful tools we have to prevent lifelong infection, liver failure, and liver cancer,” said Goldstein.

“Turning away from a proven, lifesaving intervention puts infants at unnecessary risk and undermines the very foundation of evidence-based public health. Despite this misguided decision, the hepatitis B birth dose will remain available in Massachusetts, and the Department of Public Health continues to strongly recommend that every newborn receive a dose just after birth,” he said.

Healey this year signed legislation allowing the DPH to issue its own vaccine recommendations, despite what the CDC issues, telling reporters Wednesday the department will do the same and continue recommending the hepatitis B vaccine for newborns, even if the CDC moves to roll back its current recommendation. Under that legislation, the DPH can also set its own immunization schedules and requirements in Massachusetts, including for the Childhood Vaccine Program.

“No matter what ACIP does in the next couple of days, we are going to make sure that vaccine (Hepatitis B) remains available here in Massachusetts,” the governor said.

Healey also went after Kennedy in a press release last week for a post on the CDC website that she says “insinuates a link between vaccines and autism,” calling it “the latest troubling installment.” The governor went on to say Kennedy and the CDC’s claims were “based on conspiracy theories and false information,” and not rooted in science.

The HHS pushed back against the governor, telling the Herald in a statement that Healey is “just simply wrong,” going on to explain that the update brings the CDC website “in line with our commitment to transparency and gold standard science.”

The CDC has recommended the hepatitis B vaccine at birth for over 30 years.

Gov Maura Healey (Stuart Cahill/Boston Herald)