On the subject of vaccines, nearly nothing that comes out of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s mouth is true.
The person accountable for the nation’s well being and nicely being is impervious to science, experience and data. His model of vanity is not only harmful, it’s deadly. Undermining trust in vaccines, he can have the blood of youngsters all over the world on his arms.
Scratch that.
He already does, as he presides over the second largest measles outbreak on this nation because the illness was declared “eradicated” 1 / 4 century in the past.
“Vaccines have grow to be a divisive situation in American politics,” Kennedy wrote the opposite day in a Wall Street Journal essay, “however there may be one factor all events can agree on: The U.S. faces a disaster of public belief.”
The shortage of self-awareness could be humorous if it weren’t so tragic.
Over the previous 20 years or so, Kennedy has executed greater than virtually another American to destroy the general public’s belief in vaccines and science. And now he’s bemoaning the very factor he has helped trigger.
Earlier this month, Kennedy fired the 17 medical and public well being specialists of the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices — certified docs and public well being specialists — and changed them with a bunch of (principally) anti-vaxxers with the intention to pursue his relentless, ascientific campaign.
On Thursday, at its first assembly, his newly reconstituted council voted to ban the preservative thimerosal from the few remaining vaccines that comprise it, regardless of many research exhibiting that thimerosal is secure. On that time, even the Food and Drug Administration website is blunt: “A strong physique of peer-reviewed scientific research performed within the U.S. and different nations help the security of thimerosal-containing vaccines.”
“For those who searched the world large, you can not discover a much less appropriate individual to be main healthcare efforts in the US or the world,” psychiatrist Allen Frances instructed NPR on Thursday. Frances, who chaired the duty pressure that modified how the Diagnostic and Statistical Handbook of Psychological Problems, or DSM, defines autism, revealed an essay within the New York Instances on Monday explaining why the incidence of autism has elevated however is neither an epidemic nor associated to vaccines.
“The speedy rise in autism instances shouldn’t be due to vaccines or environmental toxins,” Frances wrote, “however is quite the results of modifications in the best way that autism is outlined and assessed — modifications that I helped put into place.”
However Kennedy shouldn’t be one to let the details stand in the best way of his cockamamie theories. Producers way back eliminated thimerosal from childhood vaccines due to unfounded fears it contained mercury that might accumulate within the mind and unfounded fears a couple of relationship between mercury and autism.
That didn’t cease one in every of Kennedy’s new council members, Lyn Redwood, who as soon as led Youngsters’s Well being Protection, the anti-vaccine group based by Kennedy, from declaring a victory for youngsters.
“Eradicating a identified neurotoxin from being injected into our most susceptible inhabitants is an effective place to start out with making America wholesome once more,” Redwood instructed the committee.
Autism charges, by the best way, have continued to climb regardless of the thimerosal ban. However worry not, gullible Individuals, Kennedy has promised to pinpoint a trigger for the complicated situation by September!
Like his boss, Kennedy simply makes stuff up.
On Wednesday, he halted a $1-billion American dedication to Gavi, a company that gives vaccines to tens of millions of youngsters all over the world, wrongly accusing the group of failing to research opposed reactions to the diptheria vaccine.
“That is totally disastrous for youngsters all over the world and for public well being,” Atul Gawande, a surgeon who labored within the Biden administration, instructed the New York Instances.
Unilaterally, and opposite to the proof, Kennedy determined to desert the CDC advice that wholesome pregnant ladies obtain COVID vaccines. However an unvaccinated pregnant lady’s COVID an infection can result in severe well being issues for her new child. In truth, a study last year discovered that infants born to such moms had “unusually excessive charges” of respiratory misery at or simply after start. Based on the CDC, almost 90% of infants who had been hospitalized for COVID-19 had unvaccinated moms. Additionally, vaccinated mothers can cross protecting antibodies to their fetuses, who will be unable to get a COVID shot till they’re 6 months previous.
What else? Oh sure: Kennedy as soon as instructed podcaster Joe Rogan that the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic was “vaccine-induced flu” although no flu vaccine existed on the time.
He additionally instructed Rogan {that a} 2003 research by doctor scientist Michael Pichichero, an professional on using thimerosal in vaccines, concerned feeding infants 6 months previous and youthful mercury-contaminated tuna sandwiches, and that 64 days later, the mercury was nonetheless of their system. “Who would try this?” Kennedy demanded.
Properly, nobody.
In the study, 40 infants had been injected with vaccines containing thimerosal, whereas a management group of 21 infants obtained pictures that didn’t comprise the preservative. None was fed tuna. Ethylmercury, the type of mercury in thimerosal, the researchers concluded, “appears to be eradicated from blood quickly through the stools.” (BTW, the mercury present in fish is methylmercury, a special chemical, which might harm the mind and nervous system. In a 2012 deposition for his divorce, which was revealed final 12 months, Kennedy said he suffered reminiscence loss and mind fog from mercury poisoning brought on by consuming an excessive amount of tuna fish. He additionally revealed he has a useless worm in his mind.)
Kennedy’s tuna sandwich anecdote on Rogan’s podcast was “a ChatGPT-level of hallucination,” said Morgan McSweeney, a.okay.a. “Dr. Noc,” a scientist with a doctorate in pharmaceutical sciences, specializing in immunology and antibodies. McSweeney debunks the idiotic medical claims of non-scientists like Kennedy in his well-liked social media movies.
Talking of AI hallucinations, on Tuesday, at a congressional committee listening to, Kennedy was questioned about inaccuracies, misinformation and made up analysis and citations for nonexistent research in the first report from his Make America Wholesome Once more Fee.
The report centered on how American kids are being harmed by their poor diets, publicity to environmental toxins and, predictably, over-vaccination. It was instantly savaged by specialists. “This isn’t an evidence-based report, and for all sensible functions, it needs to be junked at this level,” Georges C. Benjamin, government director of the American Public Well being Assn. told the Washington Post.
If Kennedy was honest about enhancing the well being of American kids he would deal with combating actual scourges like gun violence, drug overdoses, despair, poverty and lack of entry to preventive healthcare. He could be preventing the proposed cuts to Medicaid tooth and nail.
Do you suppose he even is aware of that over the previous 50 years, the lives of an estimated 154 million children have been saved by vaccines?
Or that he cares?
