The recommendations of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices now go to the agency's acting director for approval. Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images

In their most significant move so far, the newly appointed US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisers voted Friday to abandon universal hepatitis B vaccination for newborns, a massive shift in US immunization policy that experts say will lead to increased illness.

Hepatitis B vaccination has been recommended for all infants in the US since 1991, a move that helped slash infections in children from an estimated 18,000 cases per year to about 20. The current CDC vaccine schedule recommends the first dose at birth, a second dose at 1 month or 2 months, and a third at 6 months to 15 months.

On Friday, membe

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