Five soldiers have been injured in a shooting at an army base in the US – with authorities placing the location in “lockdown”.

“The installation was locked down at 11.04am and law enforcement is on the scene,” the Fort Stewart base in Georgia wrote on Facebook.

It said the incident took place at the 2nd Armoured Brigade Combat Team area and casualties had been reported.

The gunman has been arrested and there is “no active threat to the community”, the base added.

“The incident remains under investigation and no additional information will be released until the investigation is complete,” it said. The lockdown was lifted at 12.10pm local time.

Governor Brian Kemp said he and his family were “saddened by today’s tragedy”.

“We are keeping the victims, their families, and all those who answer the call to serve in our hearts and prayers, and we ask that Georgians everywhere do the same,” he wrote on X.

Fort Stewart is around 25 miles (362km) southeast of Atlanta and is the largest US Army base east of the Mississippi River. It houses thousands of soldiers assigned to the army’s 3rd Infantry Division and their family members.

The fort’s three schools, which have nearly 1,400 students, were also placed under lockdown. Three schools outside the base also took steps similar to a lockdown “out of an abundance of caution”.

Donald Trump has been briefed on the shooting and the US president is monitoring the situation, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a post on X.

America’s vaccine-sceptic health secretary has announced $500m (£375.8m) worth of cuts to their development in the country.

The US health department is cancelling contracts and pulling funding for jabs to fight viruses like COVID-19 and the flu, it was announced on Tuesday.

Robert F Kennedy Jr, known as RFK Jr, said 22 projects developing mRNA vaccines will be halted. It is the latest in a series of decisions to reduce US vaccine programmes.

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The health secretary has fired the panel that makes vaccine recommendations, reduced recommendations for COVID-19 shots, and refused to endorse vaccines despite a worsening measles outbreak.

RFK Jr claims the US will now prioritise “safer, broader vaccine strategies, like whole-virus vaccines and novel platforms that don’t collapse when viruses mutate”.

Responding to the announcement of cuts, Mike Osterholm, a University of Minnesota expert on infectious diseases and pandemic preparations, said: “I don’t think I’ve seen a more dangerous decision in public health in my 50 years in the business.”

Dr Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, said RFK Jr’s move was short-sighted and that mRNA vaccines “certainly saved millions of lives”, including during the pandemic.

MRNA vaccines work by delivering a snippet of genetic code into the body that triggers an immune response, rather than introducing a real version of the virus.

According to the UK Health Security Agency, the “leading advantage of mRNA vaccines is that they can be designed and produced more quickly than traditional vaccines”.

Moderna, which was studying a combo mRNA shot that can tackle COVID and flu for the US health department, previously said it believed mRNA could speed up production of flu jabs compared with traditional vaccines.

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Scientists are also exploring how mRNA could be used in cancer immunotherapies and in other illnesses.

At the White House earlier this year, billionaire tech entrepreneur Larry Ellison praised mRNA for its potential to treat cancer.

RFK Jr touts ‘effective’ alternative

The health department said the abandoned mRNA projects signal a “shift in vaccine development priorities.”

“Let me be absolutely clear, HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them,” Mr Kennedy said in a statement.

Later, he said work is underway on an alternative – a “universal vaccine” that mimics “natural immunity”.

“It could be effective – we believe it’s going to be effective – against not only coronaviruses, but also flu,” he said.

The US House Oversight Committee has issued subpoenas for depositions with former president Bill Clinton and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton relating to the sex trafficking investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.

The Republican-controlled committee also subpoenaed the Justice Department for files relating to the paedophile financier, as well as eight former top law enforcement officials.

Donald Trump has denied prior knowledge of Epstein‘s crimes, claiming he ended their relationship a long time ago.

The US president has repeatedly tried to draw a line under the Justice Department’s decision not to release a full accounting of the investigation, but politicians from both major political parties, as well as many in Mr Trump’s political base, have refused to drop their interest in the Epstein files.

Epstein died in a New York jail cell in 2019 awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges, and since then, conspiracy theories have swirled about what information investigators gathered on him and who else may have been involved in his crimes.

Republicans on the House Oversight Committee initiated the subpoenas for the Clintons last month, as well as demanding all communications between former president Joe Biden’s Democrat administration and the Justice Department about Epstein.

The committee previously issued a subpoena for an interview with Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, who had been serving a prison sentence in Florida for luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein. She was recently transferred to another facility in Texas.

Mr Clinton was among those acquainted with Epstein before the criminal investigation against him in Florida became public two decades ago. He has never been accused of wrongdoing by any of the women who say Epstein abused them.

Mr Clinton previously said, through a spokesperson, that while he travelled on Epstein’s jet, he never visited his homes and had no knowledge of his crimes.

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The subpoenas give the Justice Department until 19 August to hand over the requested records.

The committee is also asking the former officials to appear for depositions throughout August, September and October, concluding with Hillary Clinton on 9 October and Bill Clinton on 14 October.

Although several former presidents, including Mr Trump, have been issued congressional subpoenas, none has ever appeared before members under compulsion.

Last month, Mr Trump instructed Attorney General Pam Bondi to release information presented to the grand jury that indicted Maxwell for helping Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls.