Since Robert F. Kennedy Jr. assumed his position as the head of the Department of Health and Human Services, he has moved quickly to retool department policy to reflect his antivaccine views.
By abruptly halting U.S. support for efforts to distribute vaccines around the world, Kennedy has shifted the direction of global health policy in a way that many health experts consider misguided and dangerous. Surgeon and former USAID official Atul Gawande called the decision to end U.S. support for Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, “a travesty and a nightmare.”
Here in the U.S., where measles cases are at their highest rates in more than a quarter-century — and the year is only half over — Kennedy continues to cast doubt on the efficacy of vaccines. Top vaccine experts at the FDA and the CDC have resigned since Kennedy took office; he also fired all the members of the federal vaccine advisory group and staffed it with a number of appointees who hold openly antivaccine views.
Now, some in the healthcare community are pushing back. Earlier this week, for example, six major medical organizations filed a lawsuit against the health secretary and HHS, charging that the department’s efforts to limit access to vaccines defy science and threaten the public’s health.
Another group of health experts is taking a different tack to protect Americans from preventable illness. With support from Alumbra, philanthropist Christy Walton’s collective of organizations, the newly created Vaccine Integrity Project seeks to safeguard vaccine access in the U.S.
Launched by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP), the Vaccine Integrity Project will consult with others in the field and develop recommendations for “how vaccine use can remain grounded in the best available science, free from external influence and focused on optimizing protection of individuals, families and communities against vaccine-preventable diseases,” according to the announcement. The project’s steering committee includes high-level public health and policy experts, including former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, and Harvey Fineberg, former president of the National Academy of Medicine. It is headed by CIDRAP director Michael Osterholm.
In terms of Christy Walton’s role, the announcement says only that the Vaccine Integrity Project “is supported by an unrestricted gift from Alumbra, a foundation established by philanthropist Christy Walton.” The website for Alumbra — officially named Innovaciones Alumbra, or iAlumbra — is light on specific detail and we weren’t able to get in touch by press time, but it’s clear from this and other recent actions that this particular Walton heir is charting an independent path for herself and her giving.
Christy Walton and her giving
The Waltons have long been the richest family in the U.S., with a collective fortune well over $200 billion, according to Forbes. The family’s wealth is fueled by Walmart, often ranked as the world’s largest retailer by sales. Christy Walton is the widow of John Walton, one of Walmart founder Sam Walton’s four children. John, who died in a plane crash in 2005, left about 17% of his fortune to Christy; the rest went to their son Lukas and to charity. Forbes currently puts Christy Walton’s fortune at over $19 billion.
The Walton Family Foundation, created by Sam Walton and his wife Helen, is one of the largest foundations in the U.S., and has the highest profile among the family’s giving vehicles. But as my colleague Michael Kavate has reported, the clan has founded a number of other philanthropies, including several that maintain a lower profile, including Christy Walton’s Alumbra Innovations Foundation, which iAlumbra’s website lists as one of six organizations within the Walton heir’s collective.
As Kavate pointed out, the Alumbra Innovations Foundation has grown significantly in recent years, thanks in part to several large contributions from Lukas Walton, a major philanthropist in his own right. Other organizations and companies under the iAlumbra umbrella support ocean vitality, land and water stewardship, sense of place (with a geographic focus on Baja California Sur in Mexico), and resilient communities, “through business investment and philanthropy,” according to the website.
A look at Christy Walton’s philanthropy over the years indicates that her support for the Vaccine Integrity Project is in alignment with at least some of her past giving. Much of it is science and environment-based, which tracks with the significant environmental giving of her son Lukas, but she has also supported a number of organizations with a healthcare focus, including the U.C. San Diego School of Medicine, the World Mosquito Program, and Planned Parenthood.
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Christy Walton has expressed quiet but consistent opposition to Trump
While a number of America’s wealthiest people were quick to express fealty to the new administration, Christy Walton has been one of the few billionaires to openly oppose Trump and his political agenda this year. Her anti-Trump stance goes back to his first term: She was an early and generous supporter of The Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump PAC created in 2019. (According to the tagline on its website, “We’re here to stop Trump, Break MAGA, and save America.”) Walton also co-hosted a fundraiser for Kamala Harris last fall.
In March, Walton paid for a New York Times ad that didn’t mention the president, but encouraged Americans “to uphold national dignity, respect allies, and engage in civic discourse.” Many observers saw the ad as a response to Trump’s foreign policy, according to a Fortune report. In June, Walton paid for another ad that promoted the nationwide “No Kings” protests on June 14. The full-page ad, which featured the Statue of Liberty, included a list of declarations, including this: “We are the people of the United States of America. The honor, dignity, and integrity of our country are not for sale.”
After the ad was published, Walton told CBS News, through a spokesperson, that she supports peaceful protest. “She condemns violence in all forms and her message promotes civic engagement, peaceful dialogue, and the sharing of diverse views and voices,” the spokesperson said.
Walton made it clear that by promoting the ad, she was speaking only for herself. Walmart quickly sought to distance itself from the ad. The director of Walmart’s global press office told Forbes, “the advertisement [sic] from Christy Walton are in no way connected to or endorsed by Walmart,” adding that Walton does not “serve on the board or play any role in decision-making at Walmart.”
That didn’t stop some Trump supporters from calling for a boycott of the retail giant, and the administration itself also slapped back. “A left-wing billionaire feels like burning some of her inheritance for a PR stunt,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement to MSN.
What’s in the works at the Vaccine Integrity Project?
It’s a measure of our current political landscape that supporting peaceful protest is considered controversial by some. It’s also a sign of the times that there is a need for an entity like the Vaccine Integrity Project — and for philanthropic funding to support it.
The project is in its early stages, and according to an interim update published in June, it has formulated a set of recommendations for its work going forward, including: “increasing communication, developing and disseminating clinical guidance and tools, maintaining the nation’s vaccine infrastructure, stabilizing the vaccine safety system, supporting state and local health departments, safeguarding insurance coverage, continuing the flow of data for decision-making, and building an overarching coalition for strategy and alignment.”
This is work that, in a normal administration, would be largely overseen by HHS. And while the interim update doesn’t level direct criticism at Trump or Kennedy, it does so implicitly: If the administration and its health secretary had more respect for vaccines and the body of scientific evidence supporting their efficacy, it would be doing this work itself.
As CIDRAP director Michael Osterholm said when the Vaccine Integrity Project was announced, “This project acknowledges the unfortunate reality that the system that we’ve relied on to make vaccine recommendations and to review safety and effectiveness data faces threats. It is prudent to evaluate whether independent activities may be needed to stand in its place and how nongovernmental groups might operate to continue to provide science-based information to the American public.”
