The Dangerous Decline in Vaccination Rates
NEWS | 14 May 2025
Michael Calore: Yeah. All of this data coming out, and the outbreak, and vaccine hesitancy that we're seeing in society are happening at a moment when we have a new cabinet secretary for health and human services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has brought many of these beliefs about vaccinations being bad and about how public health should be managed into his job. What kind of energy is he bringing? We all know the answer to this, but I want to break it down. I want to talk about what his role in this moment will be. Katie Drummond: I think it's really important to be really, really clear about RFK Jr., about his legacy, about the damage that he and others have done to this country, and to the integrity of trust in science and in scientific research in the United States. I think one of the really interesting things we're seeing play out now with RFK Jr. is that he is walking back, or modifying, or trying to tread this very careful line where he doesn't come out and enthusiastically deny that vaccines are safe and effective, which they are. But he doesn't want to go so far in the other direction, either. He's essentially trying to launder his history in the eyes of the American public. But the reality is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been leading the charge against vaccinations in this country for decades. He was the chair of the Children's Health Defense, which is a nonprofit that campaigns very vigorously against vaccinations. He has many times suggested things like that vaccines cause autism. I remember during the pandemic he said that COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people. He said, "The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese." More recently, we have seen him try to tread the line where he is essentially saying things like, "People should think about vaccines. They should talk to their doctor. This is a personal choice." I don't really think it is actually a personal choice. I think it is a choice that you make with the knowledge that you live among a community of other people. You don't necessarily get vaccines just to protect yourself or just to protect your child. You get vaccines to protect the entire community that you live within. This is a population-wide imperative. That's something that I think even now in his current role, where he does need to tread a more careful line or he is trying to tread a more careful line, he has failed spectacularly to communicate that to the American public. Lauren Goode: Katie, right now, is Kennedy in support of MMR, or is he still toeing the line on vaccines? What's the latest? Katie Drummond: Well, I think the most recent comments he has made about MMR, after months of a lot of pressure and a lot of back-and-forth, he said, "The MMR vaccine is the most effective way to prevent measles." He has said that. That being said, in recent months he has also said things that directly contradict that statement or that call that statement into question. He did an interview with Fox News in March, so just a little over a month ago, where he said, "There are adverse events from the vaccine. It does cause deaths every year. It causes all the illnesses that measles itself causes, encephalitis and blindness, et cetera. People ought to be able to make that choice for themselves." I want to be very clear here. Healthy people, generally speaking, healthy kids, healthy adults who go get the MMR vaccine do not die from that vaccine. That is not a thing. What he is saying is false. He's saying it on Fox News and he's saying it to millions of Americans. Many of whom, if they are regular viewers of Fox News and regular consumers of right-leaning and far-right news organizations, they are already asking questions about vaccines. They are already potentially deciding not to vaccinate their kids. Maybe they are deciding not to get their own vaccines, not to get the flu shot every year. They are already a vulnerable community of people. What he is doing in interviews like that is he is further sowing doubt in that community, in those populations of people around the safety and efficacy of these vaccines. I don't really care if, at some point now, he says the MMR vaccine is the most effective way to prevent measles. Well, cool, dude. You have spent the last several months in your role as a government official, and the last several decades as a high profile person on this planet, telling everybody that this vaccine and other vaccines are not safe. That they might kill you. That is not true.
Author: Fernanda González. Lauren Goode. Michael Calore. Katie Drummond. Zoë Schiffer. Kate Knibbs. Caroline Haskins. Sandro Iannaccone. Anna Lagos. Molly Taft.
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