Braining COVID Vaccines and Longevity
Written by Edward Hudgens, PhD
By Ed Hudgens: June 11, 2025
Braining COVID Vaccines and Longevity
Here in D.C., a current controversy concerning COVID-19 vaccines highlights a major roadblock on the path to longevity: the difficulty individuals have in thinking clearly about the complexities of taking their health into their own hands. U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. has removed all 17 members of the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, centers overseen by HHS. He plans to replace them with new members. This follows RFK’s announcement that HHS, along with the Food and Drug Administration, will no longer recommend COVID vaccines for healthy children, though the choice is still up to parents and their doctors. This is a major departure from current CDC guidelines. Reports are that CDC officials, many now fired, were not involved in and strongly disagreed with that decision. So how can parents—I have two kids—who are deciding whether or not to get their kids or themselves vaccinations—I had mine!—think about these rival recommendations? Here are factors to consider:The value of vaccinations was recognized as far back as the 1700s. Science and evidence suggest that vaccinations have saved millions from suffering and death.
But RFK has often suggested a link between vaccines and autism in children.
Indeed, autism rates in the U.S. grew from 6.7 per 1,000 children in 2000 to 27.6 per 1,000 children by 2020.
Yet this increase occurred before the 2020 COVID pandemic, and a study to which RFK often alludes linking vaccines and autism has been retracted.
Still, in the U.S., 76% of COVID deaths were in individuals over 65 years old, and 93% over 50. But the rate for kids 17 and under was only .00147%, 1,696 out of 1,071,902. And vaccine rates among those kids not killed by COVID were much lower than in the over 50 and over 65 groups.
And during the pandemic, U.S. government officials and others in authority stifled legitimate questions about the efficacy of preventive measures like mask mandates and lockdowns; Sweden did not enforce strict lockdowns and had lower death rates than other developed countries.
On the other hand, in the U.S. some 234,046 children 17 and under were hospitalized with confirmed cases of COVID, with another 510,987 hospitalized with suspected cases.
Which side to take? Americans find such information and conflicting government pronouncements confusing to the point that 28% of respondents in a recent survey mistakenly thought that COVID vaccines have caused thousands of deaths.
Now picture the hundreds of steps on the path to longevity that will be subject to confusion and fear: we’ll all have wearable and implanted health trackers; Ais will monitor us in real time, accessing all of our personal genetics and bio-data; and Ais will diagnose our ailments and devising our treatments. But a 2020 survey found that 60% of Americans would be uncomfortable if their healthcare provider relied on AI for their medical care.
Clearly, if we’re to move from “sickcare” to healthspan and longevity, we must develop a strategy to rewiring the thinking processes of public and policymakers.
First, we should elevate longevity education efforts above political and partisan differences as much as possible.
Second, we must insist on open and honest discussions, not censored and dogmatic.
Third, we must help public and policymakers understand that the discoveries, technologies and their applications to longevity are always experimental, evolving, and prone to uncertainties. But comfort with this way of thinking should not result in too much caution but, rather, should spur proaction, to try, fail, learn, try again and progress towards a future that can vanquish the ailments that have always plagued humanity.
Let’s develop futurist brains as well as futurist technology!
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Edward Hudgins, Ph.D., is Executive Director of Humanity Plus, founder of the Human Achievement Alliance, and an expert on public policy, technology, and culture.