Following the closure of the Missouri Immunization Coalition, "I'm very fearful of the vacuum of information."

The Missouri Immunization Coalition was a non-profit that focused on advocacy, education and training around vaccines.

Cuts to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention last April led to a loss of funding for the group, and it were forced to shutter in summer 2025.

Lynelle Phillips, the coalition’s board president, sat down with Robin Vanderbeck, a staff member, to discuss what the group did and how their closure could impact vaccination in the state.

Lynelle Phillips: The idea to form the coalition was in 2018, 2019 where we realized that all of the professionals that advocated for immunizations were just sort of dispersed among different organizations.

So, you had Primary Care Association, you had the Nurses Association, you had Public Health Association, and so, in all of our own ways, we would advocate for immunizations, but we weren't coalesced into one voice, and the anti-vaccine movement is coalesced into one voice.

So, early on, one of our main activities was working with the local health departments to enable them to be able to give COVID shots. Some of it was very logistical, like, if they needed a deep freeze freezer for the mRNA vaccines, we’d buy them a deep freeze freezer, you know, if they needed educational material, we would make educational material

Whatever they needed, we were facilitating their ability to do their job. Later on, we had to zoom out again to, you know, childhood vaccines, regular adult vaccines.

Robin Vanderbeck: I feel like now, especially with all of the confusion around vaccines, I feel like Immunization Coalition could have done a lot with that to have one central spot of information to continuously keep that updated for, like, providers, especially, as we did monthly meetings and things like that.

So, that's something I definitely would have liked to have done if I was still there.

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Listen • 4:12

Lynelle Phillips: I think it's just the vacuum of information, I mean, we were the go-to and we were, I think the state conference was a really important source of collaboration and morale.

I mean, it's —

Robin Vanderbeck: Community.

Lynelle Phillips: — community, like, you know how hard it is to be involved in the vaccine business right now?

It's such a challenge, and I feel like we offered information, we offered moral support, we offered a sense of community — so you're not just isolated out there giving shots all day, like, you know you're part of a whole community.

I think our providers are out there unsupported, I think our parents are out there unsupported, and I'm very fearful of the sort of the vacuum of information out there and advocacy.