RFK Jr. Steps Up His Dangerous Anti-Vaccine Efforts - Rob Horowitz

RFK Jr. Steps Up His Dangerous Anti-Vaccine Efforts - Rob Horowitz

Going back on a solemn commitment he made to Senator Bill Cassidy, chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, to secure his confirmation vote, Robert. F. Kennedy Jr. personally ordered the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to abandon its well-established scientific guidance that vaccines do not cause autism. At the time, Mr. Kennedy made this pledge, the Louisiana senator, once a practicing physician, held the fate of his nomination in his hands.

 

Mr. Kennedy added insult to injury by employing a weaselly maneuver, enabling him to argue that he is adhering to the letter of his pledge to Mr. Cassidy, if not the spirit.  While the CDC website now falsely states that the “claim that vaccines do not cause autism is not evidence-based,” and that “studies supporting a link have been ignored by health authorities,” the secretary of health and human services left one statement at the top of the site, saying “vaccines do not cause autism.’’  A new asterisk has been added to this remaining headline, calling attention to a footnote discounting its content by noting that it “has not been removed due to an agreement with the health committee chair.”

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Mr. Kennedy’s clumsy and transparently absurd attempt to cover his backside probably only further increased Senator Cassidy’s unhappiness.. He wasted little time posting his displeasure.  “I’m a doctor who has seen people die from vaccine-preventable diseases,” the chair of the Senate Health Committee posted on X. “What parents need to hear right now is vaccines for measles, polio, hepatitis B and other childhood diseases are safe and effective and will not cause autism. Any statement to the contrary is wrong, irresponsible, and actively makes Americans sicker.”

 
Various medical experts joined Senator Cassidy in blasting RFK Jr.’s substituting his belief--- not backed up by credible studies--for the established science.  Dr. Mandy Cohen, a former CDC director, for instance, told The New York Times, “There is overwhelming evidence that vaccines do not cause autism but do save lives." She continued, saying the website change damages the C.D.C.’s credibility and "risks endangering children by driving down vaccination rates and leaving kids vulnerable to preventable diseases like measles and whooping cough,” reported The Times.

 

Where using the official imprimatur of the CDC to raise the specter of vaccines causing autism can do the most damage is among the half of US adults who are uncertain about whether these claims are definitely false.  A series of tracking polls conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), “find high exposure to the autism myth and low certainty about its accuracy.”

 

This is only the most recent example of Mr. Kennedy using the power and megaphone his cabinet position provides to express skepticism about vaccines. Taken together, these continuing expressions of skepticism unbounded by facts are likely to further drive down the rates of vaccination, leading to a resurgence in communicable diseases. The Secretary of Health's hostility to vaccines generally and evidence-free belief that mRNA vaccine technology is unsafe are also behind his ill-advised cancellation of more than $1 billion of vaccine research and development, including the development of a bird flu vaccine. 

 

RFK Jr’s arrogant conviction that he knows best, no matter what scientists, medical professionals and experts say, continues to put the health of all Americans in jeopardy and will make us less prepared for future pandemics.  After 10 months on the job, we can now fairly say that appointing RFK Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services is turning out to be the dangerous and failed experiment most of us expected.