Government officials in Guinea-Bissau have formally rejected a clinical trial that would be run by Danish researchers and funded by the US to look for alleged nonspecific harms from the newborn dose of the hepatitis B vaccine. The vaccine dose is currently recommended globally for all newborns and has been used safely and effectively for decades.

In an email to Ars Technica, one of the trial's lead researchers, Christine Stabell Benn of Bandim Health Project and the University of Southern Denmark, said that Guinea-Bissau's Council of Ministers "formally reaffirmed its non-acceptance of the study on 16 October."

The revelation that the study was formally rejected last week comes after news on Monday that judicial police in Guinea-Bissau raided Bandim Health's offices and seized vaccines. Stabell Benn highlighted that the police search came after the trial was rejected.

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Outrage has erupted among health experts over news that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is still eager to fund a widely condemned vaccine trial that would expose newborns in Guinea-Bissau to hepatitis B, putting them at high risk of a lifelong infection, which can lead to liver cirrhosis, liver cancer, and premature death.

The trial was suspended in January after its unethical design came to light and drew international outcry. Although the trial is still halted, staff of the CDC director's office told the agency's budget office in late September to set aside $1.6 million to fund the trial, according to a report by Rolling Stone. The money was to be pulled from funding for the CDC's global health security programs, which might otherwise go toward efforts like combating the Ebola outbreak currently raging in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC, did not respond to a request for comment from Ars Technica.

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