Watch Live: RFK Jr. confirmation hearing for Health Secretary underway in Senate
CBS News medical contributor Dr. Céline Gounder is pointing out some of Kennedy’s contradictions on vaccines.
He has commented that “there’s no vaccine that is safe and effective,” but also said “some of the live-virus vaccines are probably averting more problems than they’re causing.”
RFK Jr. has repeated false claims linking vaccines to autism — a theory debunked by decades of scientific research. But he insists he’s not anti-vax, saying in November, “If vaccines are working for somebody, I’m not going to take that way. People ought to have choice.”
Gounder, who is also editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News, said on “CBS Mornings Plus” Wednesday ahead of the hearing that Kennedy’s “own words demonstrate a real confusion about vaccines and the science of vaccines.”
“He’s saying, on the one hand, ‘Oh, maybe these live virus vaccines, some of those are OK,’ (but) he’s especially against the measles vaccine that is a live virus vaccine,” again contradicting himself.
Gounder alse called his statements linking autism to vaccines “thoroughly debunked.”
“We should be studying what causes autism, but if you’re studying the wrong things, you’re never going to figure out what it is,” she said. “I think big picture on vaccines, he is very dangerous, both through the power of the bully pulpit, but also through the power of the CDC and the FDA.”
