GOP congressman takes CDC director to task on sequester-affected vaccines for children

As part of their sequestration-scaremongering roundup, the White House went straight for the worst-case scenarios that would hit all of the federal government’s departments and agencies in the spending cuts’ wake — terrible calamities, like “hundreds of thousands of Americans” losing access “to primary care and preventive care like flu vaccinations and cancer screenings.” The administration circulated their state-by-state report through Congress to that effect, detailing how thousands fewer children would receive vaccinations as a direct result.

But wait a moment, said Maryland Republican Rep. Andy Harris during a House Appropriations subcommittee meeting on Tuesday that included Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control. The relevant 317 Immunization Program, receiving an approximately $30 million cut under sequestration, actually got a much shorter shrift in President Obama’s own proposed FY 2013 budget (which nobody voted for, and sidebar: We’re still waiting for the White House to get around to produce his FY 2014 budget that was due only, oh, a month ago), to the tune of a nearly $58 million cut. Does anybody else find that odd that we weren’t treated to dire warnings about vaccination-reductions under the president’s plan, but not under sequestration?

Cue the takedown, via NRO:

The White House just got served.

• Sebelius touts ObamaCare as a boon to graduates instead of the war on the young it actually is
• Chris Christie’s challenger is going for it with a million-dollar ad buy in New Jersey
• Chuck Todd: The Obama administration is trying to “criminalize journalism”

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