Comment: Senators, immunize against RFK Jr.’s vaccine hypocrisy
Published 1:30 am Friday, January 31, 2025
By Lisa Jarvis / Bloomberg Opinion
The U.S. Senate finally had the chance to publicly question Robert F. Kennedy Jr., one of President Donald Trump’s most contentious cabinet picks.
The nominee to lead the Department of Health and Human Services would have incredible influence over public health in the U.S., overseeing key agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health.
The position would give him sway over everything from guidance on routine vaccinations and regulations around abortion funding to drug pricing reforms and remaking the National Institutes of Health, the nation’s research engine.
To get the job, Kennedy must convince senators that he’s been right about a lot more than he’s been wrong; that, in fact, he’s eased into more moderate views on vaccinations and that his real focus is improving Americans’ health.
They shouldn’t fall for it.
Kennedy has tried to recast his anti-vaccine extremism as an honest effort to illuminate what he claims is unsettled science (it’s not). He insists he’s not trying to take away anyone’s shots; he’s just asking for the data supporting them. Is that so unreasonable?
Some senators seem to be buying Kennedy’s line. Texas Republican John Cornyn told reporters, “He told me he is not anti-vaccine. He is pro-vaccine safety, which strikes me as a rational position to take.” Meanwhile, Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski’s takeaway from discussing the issue with Kennedy is that she believes “people should be informed,” Politico reported.
These senators are falling into a tried-and-true trap from vaccine opponents: sow doubt in their safety and efficacy by suggesting vital information is being kept from the public. Maybe big pharma is hiding it, or perhaps the CDC or the FDA is. An offshoot of this strategy is suggesting that data doesn’t exist at all or is woefully insufficient.
The data on vaccines is out there. Beyond the studies regulators require to market the shots, decades of epidemiological data across hundreds of millions of people (for some, likely billions of people) affirm their value. Suggesting otherwise isn’t a shift toward a more moderate position on vaccines. It’s a sly way of undermining confidence in them.
Kennedy has also left a massive digital footprint of his years-long campaign against vaccines, including perpetuating a disproven theory that mercury in vaccines causes autism. There’s also his disastrous influence on the response to a measles outbreak in Samoa in 2019 that killed 83 people, mostly children, and hospitalized nearly 1,900 people.
Other equally alarming efforts have drawn attention in recent weeks. The New York Times found that Kennedy asked the FDA to revoke authorization for covid vaccines in mid-2021, just six months into the mass vaccination effort credited with saving more than 3 million lives in its first two years. His peddling of covid misinformation raised the profile and filled the coffers of the anti-vaccine nonprofit he founded, the Children’s Defense Fund, while personally enriching himself. And Kennedy’s ongoing involvement with multiple lawsuits against the maker of the HPV vaccine creates direct conflicts of interest in his oversight of the agency that regulates the vaccine. He also benefits directly from these suits as they wind through the courts.
Senators also need to consider Kennedy’s position on vaccines in the context of this moment in public health. Childhood vaccination rates in the U.S. are already falling, and as HHS secretary, Kennedy could drive them down further.
Kennedy could make other decisions that potentially had grave consequences for Americans’ health, such as selecting the outside advisers for the CDC, which recommends how and when to use vaccines.
The panel’s decisions influence state guidance on vaccines and insurance coverage for shots. Senators must ask Kennedy about his plans for that committee, including whether he intends to dismiss current members and the criteria he would use for choosing new ones.
And lawmakers can’t ignore the ongoing spread of avian flu among US poultry, livestock and wildlife. If the pandemic threat is raised, would Kennedy take the necessary steps to ensure vaccines are available to the public? His behavior suggests he either doesn’t understand or doesn’t take seriously the gravity of the situation or his potential role in managing it. Last week, Kennedy reportedly missed a meeting of senior officials to share information on future pandemic planning.
Kennedy’s habit of distorting the science to fit his own biases about vaccines is enough to disqualify him for this job. It poses a clear and present danger to the public, putting the lives of children and the most vulnerable at risk.
His habit of playing fast and loose with facts and data also matters when it comes to managing all the other areas of public health under the HHS secretary’s purview; even those with broad appeal, like overhauling nutrition guidelines. Lawmakers should worry that Kennedy can’t or won’t use evidence to develop the right solutions for America’s biggest health challenges. Ultimately, we will all be worse off for it.
Lisa Jarvis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering biotech, health care and the pharmaceutical industry. Previously, she was executive editor of Chemical & Engineering News.
