Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confirmed a lot of the medical neighborhood’s fears about him main the Division of Well being and Human Providers on Tuesday by attacking vaccination throughout a Fox Information interview.
Showing on “Hannity” for an interview with President Donald Trump’s staunch ally Sean Hannity, Kennedy addressed the ongoing measles outbreak within the West Texas space that has precipitated not less than two deaths.
A long-time anti-vaccination conspiracy theorist and activist, Kennedy argued that it was higher for individuals to get contaminated with measles as a substitute of being vaccinated.
“Measles gave you lifetime protection against measles infection. The vaccine doesn’t do that,” Kennedy mentioned, and complained that the vaccine doesn’t present maternal immunity to measles.
Nonetheless, that ignores the hazard that comes with an an infection. In line with the College of Chicago’s medical faculty, “Three in 1,000 children who contract measles will die; however, if everyone is vaccinated, no children will die.” And that’s to say nothing of the extreme problems that a lot of those that survived measles are pressured to reside with.
Kennedy additionally alleged that the measles vaccine is as lethal because the illness, a declare not supported by science.
“There are adverse events from the vaccine,” Kennedy mentioned. “It does cause deaths every year. It causes all the illnesses that measles itself causes—encephalitis and blindness, et cetera.”
However Johns Hopkins College’s Bloomberg College of Public Well being notes that the vaccine is “very safe” and that critical reactions to the vaccine are uncommon. The college additionally explains, “The risks of severe illness, death, or lifelong complications from measles infection far outweigh the generally mild side effects some people experience following vaccination.”
Along with his anti-vaccination lies, Kennedy expressed concern that households receiving public help are ready to make use of authorities help to buy sugary drinks and mentioned his company would quickly be taking motion to forestall that from occurring.
“We are literally poisoning [poor] neighborhoods by paying for 10% of their food stamps going to sugary drinks,” Kennedy mentioned.
Kennedy’s interview additional illustrates the hazard in Trump’s choice to have an anti-science advocate in charge of the nation’s main well being companies.
When he wasn’t furthering his anti-vaccination mission, the 2 males praised Trump in the course of the interview. Kennedy mentioned he believed Trump had misplaced 30 kilos over the previous few months, whereas Hannity asserted that Trump has “second-to-none” genetics.
In actuality, Trump has saved his medical data out of the general public eye at the same time as he has lobbed assaults questioning the well being of his political rivals, like former President Joe Biden and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Neither Kennedy nor Hannity addressed this lack of disclosure as they shared an on-air meal of hamburgers and fries.
