Amid one of the important measles outbreaks in over 30 years, America’s high public well being official is utilizing his platform to hawk misinformation and pretend cures and push an agenda that’s against evidence-based medication and science.
Well being and Human Providers Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is steering public well being far off track.
This diversion turns into extra harmful and tough to right every passing week.
Kennedy has refused to state unequivocally that vaccination is the one solution to forestall measles. Our vaccine works so properly — two doses are 97% efficient in opposition to the virus — that till the three tragic deaths this 12 months, nobody within the U.S. had died from the illness in a decade. Actually, measles was declared eradicated from the nation in 2000.
Ignoring actuality
And but, as circumstances rose to 935 throughout 30 states final week — a quantity that public well being consultants consider is probably going a gross underestimation — Kennedy refused to acknowledge the gravity of the state of affairs. In a NewsNation interview final week, he downplayed the outbreak right here by declaring it wasn’t as unhealthy as what different international locations, resembling Canada, are experiencing. To be clear, outbreaks in different international locations, primarily occurring in our neighbors, present all of the extra cause to encourage vaccination at residence.
Pathogens know no borders.
He then went on to falsely declare the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine comprises “a lot of aborted fetus debris and DNA particles.”
Worse, he’s actively shifting the main target from vaccination to unproven cures. Final week, Kennedy directed the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention to provide new tips for treating measles.
In line with a CBS Information report, an HHS spokesperson stated that will contain “enlisting the entire agency to activate a scientific process to treat a host of diseases, including measles, with single or multiple existing drugs in combination with vitamins and other modalities.” Kennedy says that effort is motivated by a want to assist dad and mom who oppose vaccination.
That push “is distracting from what you really need to do to control measles, which is prevent it,” says Sean O’Leary, a pediatric infectious illnesses specialist on the College of Colorado.
O’Leary notes that individuals have regarded for remedies for measles, and nothing notably works — and there definitely aren’t any cures. That features cod oil and Vitamin A, which Kennedy has pushed. (Vitamin A has been utilized in low- and middle-income international locations, the place deficiencies are frequent, to decrease the danger of significant measles issues, however it’s unlikely to be useful within the U.S., O’Leary says.)
Kennedy’s reckless technique additionally will increase the possibilities of measles returning to endemicity.
A latest paper in JAMA highlighted the grave penalties of giving up the decades-long effort to remove measles within the U.S.
Vaccination charges in opposition to routine childhood illnesses have softened, and researchers discovered that if nothing improves, measles will possible return to endemic ranges throughout the subsequent 20 years.
Their mannequin confirmed that situation would end in greater than 850,000 circumstances, 170,200 hospitalizations and a pair of,550 deaths over 25 years.
The secretary’s ill-conceived plan shouldn’t shock anybody.
For the reason that earliest days of his HHS appointment, he has pushed unproven remedies and preventions for measles. Sadly, his inaccurate messaging has had an impression. A brand new ballot by KFF discovered that 20% of adults had heard the false declare that Vitamin A can forestall measles.
Snake oil
That pretend declare is just not solely complicated People but additionally making them sick. Simply weeks after Kennedy started speaking up Vitamin A, a hospital in West Texas, the place the measles outbreak started, reported a number of kids had been admitted with liver toxicity brought on by giant doses of the complement.
That very same KFF ballot additionally discovered that within the final 12 months, the false declare that the MMR vaccine is extra harmful than measles — one other fable propagated by Kennedy — has landed on the general public’s radar. A 3rd of adults stated they’d heard the falsehood, up from simply 18% in March 2024.
Kennedy’s fixed stream of vaccine misinformation and disinformation and his ill-advised decision-making have precipitated public well being consultants to take extraordinary steps to guard the general public. Final month, the College of Minnesota’s Heart for Infectious Illness Analysis and Coverage launched the Vaccine Integrity Venture, an effort that’s nonetheless taking form however meant to defend vaccine coverage and use.
I’m thrilled to see somebody stepping up. Nonetheless, it’s deeply disturbing that issues have so quickly deteriorated beneath Kennedy’s management that People want an exterior physique to safeguard our well being. How can we anticipate the general public to parse who and what to consider?
When the measles outbreak started, public well being consultants, politicians and journalists (together with this one) virtually begged Kennedy to come back out to assist vaccination — to say, with out qualifiers or confounders, that immunization would cease the unfold.
Any hope of that’s lengthy gone. Worse, every new choice is pushing us additional away from evidence-based medication.
Lisa Jarvis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. ©2025 Bloomberg. Distributed by Tribune Content material Company.
