Health Insurers To Cover Covid And Flu Shots Despite RFK, Jr. Moves
The nation’s biggest health insurance companies will continue to cover vaccinations – including those against Covid-19 and seasonal flu – previously recommended by a federal advisory committee, America’s Health Insurance Plans said Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. In this photo is a free flu and Covid-19 vaccine shots available sign, CVS, Queens, New York. (Photo by: Lindsey Nicholson/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
The nation’s biggest health insurance companies will continue to cover vaccinations — including those against COVID-19 and seasonal flu — that were previously recommended by a federal advisory committee.
The announcement by America’s Health Insurance Plans, which includes CVS Health’s Aetna, Humana, Cigna, Centene and an array of Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans as members, comes ahead of Thursday’s first meeting of the reconstituted Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which now has new members chosen by U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vaccine critic. The committee provides guidance on vaccines to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.
“Health plans are committed to maintaining and ensuring affordable access to vaccines,” AHIP said in a statement Wednesday. “Health plan coverage decisions for immunizations are grounded in each plan’s ongoing, rigorous review of scientific and clinical evidence, and continual evaluation of multiple sources of data.”
The move by AHIP is good news for millions of Americans at a time of year when they flock to drugstores, pharmacies, physician’s offices and outpatient clinics to get their seasonal flu and COVID-19 shots. Kennedy’s changes to U.S. vaccine policy have created confusion across the country over whether certain vaccines long covered by insurance would continue to be.
AHIP has now provided some clarity. AHIP’s health plan members provide health care coverage to more than 200 million Americans.
“Health plans will continue to cover all ACIP-recommended immunizations that were recommended as of September 1, 2025, including updated formulations of the COVID-19 and influenza vaccines, with no cost-sharing for patients through the end of 2026,” AHIP said. “While health plans continue to operate in an environment shaped by federal and state laws, as well as program and customer requirements, the evidence-based approach to coverage of immunizations will remain consistent.”
It’s in the interest of the health insurance companies to cover vaccines because they are designed to keep people healthy. Thus, health plan enrollees who get flu shots can help avoid a virus that can lead to an expensive illness and potential hospitalization, which trigger more expensive claims for insurers and their members.
AHIP’s announcement comes just days before the ACIP is scheduled to discuss and eligibility requirements for certain vaccines including new COVID-19 booster shots.
Earlier this year, Kennedy fired all 17 ACIP members, drawing an outcry from the nation’s largest physician groups including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
AHIP’s effort did not go unnoticed even by groups critical of health insurance company business practices in the past.
“Although it is rare for Public Citizen to praise health insurers, AHIP’s responsible actions offer hope that a sane approach to immunizations may yet prevail,” said Dr. Robert Steinbrook, director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group.
“By committing to fully cover all immunizations that the ACIP recommended as of September 1, 2025, including updated formulations of the COVID-19 and influenza vaccines, through the end of 2026, health plans have effectively anticipated and bypassed the likely destructive actions of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s hand-picked vaccine advisory panel over the next 16 months,” Steinbrook added. “The health plans are doing what federal health agencies should be doing, promoting public health by ‘maintaining and ensuring affordable access to vaccines,’ not continuing to undermine access as Kennedy and an ACIP gone rogue are doing.”
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