In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa
And it’s not just measles. Cases of other vaccine-preventable illnesses such as whooping cough, rotavirus and Hemophilus influenza Type B are all rising as parents decline to give their kids shots. That’s not only dangerous for those children but also those who are too young to get immunizations, as well as immunocompromised people whose bodies are unable to mount a response to surging pathogens.
The decline in vaccination predates this administration, but rhetoric from officials, especially Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., supercharged skepticism toward vital public health tools. That’s prompted enormous backlash, including among Senate Republicans — so much so that the White House reportedly felt compelled to sideline Kennedy on the issue. The administration has also needed to withdraw multiple nominees for health agencies because of previous anti-vaccine comments.Whether this shift is permanent remains to be seen. Last week, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing agencies to pare back recommended childhood vaccines, even though similar changes announced in March by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were blocked in federal court.At the same time, Kennedy is still reportedly pushing to craft new “research” to support his long-debunked claims that vaccines are unsafe.
The ultimate outcome of such efforts would be to make it harder for parents to access these medical innovations to keep kids safe. It would be like lining your house with kindling as wildfires spread nearby. Someone’s bound to get burned.
