With Blatant Conflicts of Interest, the American Academy of Pediatrics Is Nothing But Big Pharma’s Lapdog

By Louis Conte, Health Freedom Editor, The MAHA Report

You may have missed this, but the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is the organization that in March brought the suit that led to Judge Brian Murphy’s absurd decision in the Massachusetts Federal District Court in Boston.

Murphy’s decision undid much of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s work vis-a-vis the nation’s childhood vaccine schedule, which the secretary saw as a massive toxic load that needed pairing down. With one strike of the gavel, Murphy temporarily halted Kennedy’s historic and much needed recommendations and suspended the secretary’s reformulated Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which advises on vaccines.

Fearing the ACIP’s recommendations become reality, the AAP went into attack mode.

As organizations such as Children’s Health Defense (CHD) prepare to challenge Murphy’s decision, it’s time to reflect on the AAP and what inspired the organization to bring the suit against the HHS in the first place.

According to its website, the AAP’s mission seems innocent enough: “We work for every child’s future. The AAP’s global mission is to attain optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all children around the world.”

The trouble is: The AAP actually doesn’t work for every child’s future. In fact, handsomely supported by Big Pharma, it works against every child’s future.

Here’s what happened. Even though Kennedy and Co. did not remove a single childhood vaccine from the official schedule, the HHS recommendation that parents share in vaccine decision-making threatened the AAP to its core. Playing lapdog to Big Pharma means defending the hands that feed them. When it comes to survival, you can’t be too careful.

So AAP went on the offensive, even though every vaccine was still available and pediatricians and parents were encouraged to discuss whether some of the vaccines were a good idea for their children.

So much for dialogue.

For the AAP, the inconvenience of talking to parents and allowing them to share in the decision-making was, apparently, a crushing burden.

At least Judge Murphy thought so. Surprise, surprise: he sided with Big Pharma…I mean the AAP.

It remains to be seen how long this madness lasts. If Murphy’s decision is not overturned, every industry trade organization in the country will file a federal suit so that they, too, stop the federal government from implementing inconvenient changes to their industries.

The AAP does not represent the interests of children – it represents the interest of their Big Pharma mega donors, as Secretary Kennedy has pointed out.

And the leading vaccine manufacturers, all of which are described as the AAP’s corporate supporters, are the entities that will feel the pinch in their bottom line when parents say ‘no thank you’ to some of their vaccines.

The AAP was the costume that Big Pharma wore in the Massachusetts Federal District Court. So dressed, the AAP calmly served as their front men.

Moreover, an examination of the AAP’s history and behavior reveals an organization that is the poster child for corporate capture.'

From the AAP’s Pediatrics

Despite overwhelming evidence that Covid vaccines cause myocarditis in young people, the AAP continues to recommend Covid vaccines for children, as this policy statement published in the organization’s journal, Pediatrics, demonstrates. One of the authors of the statement disclosed financial ties to Pfizer, while another disclosed such ties to Pfizer and Moderna, the two manufacturers of the mRNA Covid vaccines.

Was the AAP’s policy statement actually written by Pfizer and Moderna?

It is now understood that Covid poses a low risk to young people but the AAP’s policy is that you should roll the dice on your kid developing a serious cardiac condition because two physicians, paid for by Big Pharma, said you should.

Would you trust the advice of this organization?

The AAP is all about vaccines, as their Healthy Children website reveals. The first things you see are recommended vaccine schedules.

You have to look pretty hard to find anything on the AAP website about the chronic disease epidemics – obesity, diabetes, autism, among others. Puff – gone.

Vaccines are so important to the AAP that the organization launched a nationwide effort in July of 2025 to repeal all nonmedical exemptions to vaccine mandates and announced that they will join several states and recommend their own vaccine schedule instead of following federal guidance.

The AAP did not launch a nationwide effort to combat chronic childhood disease.

That is because vaccine promotion – not children – is the organization’s primary focus. That is where the Big Pharma dollars come from and what fuels large pediatric practices, as explained here.

Undark Magazine published a story in 2025 on conflicts of interests at the AAP, reporting that the organization holds an annual corporate Summit at their headquarters “for donors of $50,000 or more — a status enjoyed by pharmaceutical companies Pfizer, Merck, Moderna and Sanofi…”

In Chicago Magazine, AAP’s chief executive officer, Mark Del Monte, describes himself as an Anti-Anti-Vaxxer. One would think that AAP’s CEO would be a well-respected, veteran pediatrician but Del Monte is not a pediatrician.

He’s a lawyer - a highly paid one. According to a June 2023 filing, Del Monte’s last reported salary was $783,954.

Pretty soft.

And Anne Edwards, AAP’s chief population health officer, hauled in a cool $462,179.

Also pretty soft given the rise of chronic disease among America’s children. Good thing Edward’s pay is not related to performance.

Several other administrators pocketed over $300,000. Are you getting the picture?

The AAP is not looking after the health of America’s children. Period. Full stop. They are nothing more than Big Pharma’s lap dog.