I’ve been writing about the antivax activism, conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, and quackery of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for nearly 20 years now, having written so many posts about him that I’ve lost count. Indeed, when Donald Trump, having won the 2024 election, nominated RFK Jr. to be his Secretary of Health and Human Services, I was appalled enough to refer to him as an impending catastrophe for public health and medical research. So it was with some surprise that I awoke yesterday to be made aware of an op-ed published in Fox News by our new HHS Secretary entitled Measles outbreak is call to action for all of us. Even more shocking, the tagline for the article stated MMR vaccine is crucial to avoiding potentially deadly disease. Holy crap! I wondered. Has RFK Jr. gone pro-vaccine? On the surface, it looks that way, but if you dig deeper into the article, you’ll find that the picture is not quite as clear as it’s being portrayed.
First, a bit of background. There has been, in fact, a rather large measles outbreak raging in western Texas since late January, which, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services, has as of Friday sickened 146 (and counting), hospitalized 20, and claimed the life of one unvaccinated child, the first child to die of measles in the US since 2023. In fairness, RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary can’t be directly blamed because the outbreak started before he was confirmed and sworn in. However, there’s plenty of indirect blame attributable to him and his sycophants, toadies, and lackeys who have been spreading antivax misinformation, disinformation, pseudoscience, and conspiracy theories for years and years. This constant stream of antivax propaganda on social media and legacy media has been a powerful force to promote fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) about vaccines that has driven vaccine uptake in some areas of the country sufficiently low to fall below the threshold necessary for herd immunity.
As I’ve described for two decades, RFK Jr. has been not just antivaccine, but rabidly antivaccine. Moreover, he has consistently demonized the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine with all the standard antivax tropes, including false claims like:
- MMR causes autism. (It doesn’t.)
- Measles is a harmless childhood disease. (It isn’t.)
- The MMR vaccine makes measles more virulent. (Nope.)
There are lots of other claims that RFK Jr. has made in the past, but let’s focus on the supposedly new and improved RFK Jr. After starting out simply describing the outbreak and mentioning the death of the child, the first measles death since 2015, RFK Jr. actually mostly gets the facts about measles right, which is highly unusual for him, although I’m sure he now has people at the CDC who can do this for him. What surprised me is that he let them:
Measles is a highly contagious respiratory illness with certain health risks, especially to unvaccinated individuals. The virus spreads through direct contact with infectious droplets when an infected person breathes, coughs, or sneezes. Early symptoms include high fever, cough, runny nose, and red, watery eyes, followed by a characteristic body rash. Most cases are mild, but rare complications can be severe, including pneumonia, blindness, and encephalitis. Prior to the introduction of the vaccine in the 1960s, virtually every child in the United States contracted measles. For example, in the United States, from 1953 to 1962, on average there were 530,217 confirmed cases and 440 deaths, a case fatality rate of 1 in 1,205 cases.
On first glance, one has to wonder whether RFK Jr. has finally felt the weight of the old Spider-Man adage, “With great power there must also come great responsibility.” After all, it’s a different thing to be a citizen spreading antivax nonsense than it is to spin antivax nonsense when you’re in charge and people can die if you screw up. On the other hand, I see a lot of antivax messaging in those around, stating even with the paragraph above.
For example, I said “mostly” correct, but note the spin; “Most cases are mild.” To that, I respond: Define “mild.” Even children who do not suffer consequences like pneumonia or encephalitis do not necessarily have a “mild” disease. It’s a miserable disease, with several days of high fever and rash, along with respiratory symptoms. However, the framing is there: Measles is mostly mild.
RFK Jr. then rattles off some statistics about the outbreak, noting that 79 of the confirmed cases “involved individuals who had not received the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, while 62 cases had unknown vaccine status,” with “at least five” who had received an MMR vaccine. Note the framing there as well. He’s trying mightily to imply that more of the cases had been vaccinated; if he weren’t doing that, he would have just cited the last statistic that there were five cases in children who had received at least one dose of MMR without the “at least.”
This next part sounds a bit better:
In response to this outbreak, I have directed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) to work closely with the Texas health authorities to provide comprehensive support. HHS’ efforts include offering technical assistance, laboratory support, vaccines, and therapeutic medications as needed.
Offering technical assistance, laboratory support, and vaccines is good. I was, however, curious what RFK Jr. meant by “therapeutic medications,” given that measles is a viral disease and there are no medications that directly treat the disease. It didn’t take long to find out:
It is also our responsibility to provide up-to-date guidance on available therapeutic medications. While there is no approved antiviral for those who may be infected, CDC has recently updated their recommendation supporting administration of vitamin A under the supervision of a physician for those with mild, moderate, and severe infection. Studies have found that vitamin A can dramatically reduce measles mortality.
It’s a common antivax claim that measles is not only harmless, but that it can be treated with vitamin A. Remember that claim? It showed up a lot among antivaxxers during the Samoan measles outbreak in 2019. Here’s the thing, though. While there is evidence that administering vitamin A to children with severe measles can decrease the risk of hospitalization and death and it is indeed used in developing countries for that very purpose because children there often have vitamin deficiencies, there is little or no evidence that vitamin A makes a difference in children with normal pre-existing vitamin A levels:
Vitamin A is less commonly used for measles cases in the U.S., according to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. Doctors say one reason may be that most Americans have enough vitamin A in their diet.
“I think the big caveat of all of this is that there’s a significantly higher rate of vitamin A deficiency in developing countries,” said Dr. Alexandra Yonts, infectious disease specialist at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C. “So it is less clear whether there is any benefit in populations like in the U.S. and other developed countries.”
There’s probably little harm in recommending vitamin A, but mentioning it as well as the MMR vaccine appears strategic. Why? Doing so downplays the importance of the MMR vaccine, implying that it’s just one of multiple options, when in reality the MMR vaccine is by far the best strategy to prevent measles, with vitamin A maybe doing some good in children with measles, but in an industrialized country like the US, probably little, if any, good. Mentioning it also serves to promote the “make America healthy again” (MAHA) narrative, in which diet and exercise are everything (whether they are or not for specific conditions).
Don’t believe me? Well, then, take a look at these antivax dogwhistles embedded in a seemingly pro-vaccine article:
Parents play a pivotal role in safeguarding their children’s health. All parents should consult with their healthcare providers to understand their options to get the MMR vaccine. The decision to vaccinate is a personal one. Vaccines not only protect individual children from measles, but also contribute to community immunity, protecting those who are unable to be vaccinated due to medical reasons.
Previous messaging would have just said that parents should be encouraged to get their children vaccinated. It would not have added that qualification that the “decision to vaccinate is a personal one.” Here’s where the antivax dogwhistles really get the dogs howling:
Tens of thousands died with, or of, measles annually in 19th Century America. By 1960 — before the vaccine’s introduction — improvements in sanitation and nutrition had eliminated 98% of measles deaths. Good nutrition remains a best defense against most chronic and infectious illnesses. Vitamins A, C, and D, and foods rich in vitamins B12, C, and E should be part of a balanced diet.
The claim that improvements in sanitation and nutrition had reduced the death rate from measles by 98% before the vaccine is a classic antivax narrative designed to imply that the vaccine isn’t necessary. Also, holy hell! “Died with, but not of, measles?” That’s pure antivax dogwhistling, in which he’s clearly implying that most people with measles didn’t actually die because of the measles but of something else. (In other words, the implication is that the disease isn’t as deadly as normally thought.) We saw a very similar narrative about COVID-19 about dying “with” COVID-19 and not “of” COVID-19; it was bullshit too.
There’s even a clever embedded antivax dogwhistle in the link about “eliminated 98% of measles deaths.” I clicked on the link. It doesn’t go to any scientific reference—or even a lay publication explaining the point; rather, it goes to Our World in Data, producing a graph that is quite amazingly deceptive:
First, note that the scale is logarithmic, which is designed to flatten the appearance of changes in the incidence rates in order to make them look less dramatic, particularly the case rate, where the transition point around 1963 (the year the measles vaccine was first licensed) that is so obvious in graphs of incidence with time becomes obscured. Moreover, if you look run your cursor over the graph at the link, you’ll see that the death rate fell from 0.22 per 100,000 in 1960 to 0.0092 per 100,000 by 1974. So, contrary to antivax claims, the measles vaccine the vaccine did dramatically decrease the death rate from measles after all! Thanks, RFK!
I can’t stop, though. Let’s take a look at the data as they are normally graphed:
This was very much an intentional tactic designed to make the vaccine look as though it didn’t do much. Moreover, harping on the decline in the death rate from measles before the vaccine, while accurate, is also misleading. I also like to point out that measles is a virus that is transmitted through the air. Sanitation doesn’t do much to control an infectious respiratory disease. Although better nutrition could also have helped, this narrative also neglects what was really behind the massive decline in mortality, specifically improvements in medicine and supportive care that allowed more people with measles to recover. Chief among these improvements in medical treatment (as Dr. Paul Offit noted) was the introduction of effective antibiotics that could treat secondary bacterial infections, in particular bacterial pneumonia, a potentially deadly complication of measles.
Indeed, this is an antivax trope that in 2010 I dubbed “vaccines didn’t save us,” a highly intellectually dishonest argument, as explained in the link. The short version is that, while it is true that mortality from measles had plummeted in the decades before the vaccine due to better medical care and nutrition, every year there were still 400-500 people dying of measles, a number that antivaxxers appear to consider unimportant and want to see again (more, actually, given the increase in the US population since the early 1960s), and considerable misery from from the huge numbers of new cases every year (most people caught measles before they turned 15), which resulted in roughly 48,000 hospitalizations per year and 1,000 cases of encephalitis. I don’t know about you, but I consider that many deaths and hospitalizations to be a big problem.
Also note the pivot to diet, where RFK Jr. states that good nutrition “remains a best defense against most chronic and infectious illnesses and then recommends foods rich in vitamins A, C, D and foods rich in vitamin B12, C, and E. First, I have to ask: Who edited this? He mentions vitamin C twice. Second, and more importantly, here RFK Jr. is clearly implying that good nutrition and foods rich in the listed vitamin can prevent measles. They can’t. Measles is one of the most highly contagious viruses known to science. Only the vaccine or immunity from a previous infection can prevent your catching measles if you are exposed to the virus. RFK Jr. is doing nothing more than rehashing a common antivax narrative that you can prevent nearly any disease if you are sufficiently “virtuous” with respect to diet and lifestyle. It reminds me of when Bill Maher claimed he didn’t need the flu vaccine because his diet and lifestyle would protect him, leading Bob Costas to retort incredulously, “Oh, come on, Superman!“
All of this leads me to consider the questions: Has RFK Jr. gone provaccine? Has he really betrayed the antivaccine movement? The answer to the first question is: Probably not. I tend to think that RFK Jr. knows that politically it’s a very, very bad look if he doesn’t take some conventional public health action to address the outbreak, given his past history. In this context, I see the mentions of dying “with” measles, vitamin A to treat measles, emphasizing “choice” about vaccines, and the like are winks and nods to antivaxxers that he’s still one of them.
Amusingly, not all of them are getting it, as The Real Truther documents:
I’ll add a couple more:
Of course, RFK Jr. did the same sort of thing when his “MAHA manifesto” didn’t include even one reference to vaccines and antivaxxers noticed. That’s what he gets for having been an antivax activist for so long. Antivaxxers are so annoyed with and disappointed in RFK Jr.—they feel so betrayed— that it’s even bubbled over enough that mainstream media has noticed:
- RFK Jr. Sparks Anti-Vaxxer Anger: ‘No Different Than Fauci’ (Newsweek)
- ‘Not MAHA’: Anti-Vaxxers Rage at RFK Jr. Over Flip-Flop (The Daily Beast)
- RFK’s Flip-Flop on the Measles Shot Is Ripping the Anti-Vax World Apart (Mother Jones)
Even Del Bigtree is at a loss for words, which almost never happens:
One of the major architects of the MAHA movement has yet to say anything at all. Film producer, Kennedy’s former campaign manager, and longtime fixture in the anti-vaccine world, Del Bigtree, is now the CEO of MAHA Action, a group made up of former team Kennedy staffers explicitly dedicated to furthering Kennedy’s MAHA agenda. Bigtree didn’t respond to requests for comment from Mother Jones about Kennedy’s remarks. He previously tried to reassure the faithful that Kennedy would remember his friends and principles when ensconced in the halls of power. “For all the doubters,” he tweeted in December with a link to a story about how, if confirmed, Kennedy would “investigate” the link between vaccines and autism. (Vaccines do not cause autism and such a purported link has been debunked many times over.)
Meanwhile, antivax activist Megan Redshaw laments how she had previously “written for RFK Jr.” and worked on his books but now doesn’t recognize him in the op-ed:
Hilarious. There’s no way CDC staffers would ever write things like “dying with measles” or implying that nutrition can prevent measles, for example.
So what is really going on? Did the “deep state” get to him? Or has RFK Jr. finally felt the weight of his new office and realized that he is now responsible for dealing with outbreaks like this? Maybe. I’m not so sure, though, as I can’t help but suspect that RFK Jr. might also be trying to be too clever by half—and failing. He’s spent the last 20 years promoting the most bonkers antivax misinformation, conspiracy theories, and pseudoscience, and now, as improbable as it is, he is in control of all nonmilitary medical, public health, and medical research programs. He thinks he has to do this because if he went too antivax too fast he might risk going too far and being ousted. So he advocates for the MMR, but he dilutes the recommendation with all sorts of antivax dog whistles. Unfortunately, his fans are insufficiently subtle to realize that that’s what he’s doing and view him as having betrayed them. In a way, he has—for now. What I fear is that he will someday redeem himself in their eyes.
Remember, deeds, not words, are the standard by which you should judge RFK Jr., but his words are also important. Here, even while seemingly having flip-flopped, he’s included obvious antivax dog whistles, a wink and a nod, whose purpose seems to be to let antivaxxers know he’s still one of them. I hope the press picks up on this, but so far (mostly) they have not.
22 replies on “Has RFK Jr. betrayed the antivax movement?”
I suppose it was inevitable though.
Fanatics always wind up complaining about how other fellow travellers are not dedicated enough.
Alternatively, RFK jr. might have just discovered that authority comes with responsibility, even if responsibility is as diluted as it is for politicians. It is one thing to be held responsible for a measles outbreak on a distant island as maverick/lunatic vaccine critic/antivaxxer by a small part of the public. Having a measles wildfire break out while you are secretary of health and human services is a different kettle of fish.
I don’t think so. Your points would imply Kennedy has a sense of right and wrong, and he’s never demonstrated that before.
I think he’ll use the fact that he actually endorsed MMR during a large measles outbreak as “proof” he’s truly not anti-vaccine and that these upcoming “vaccine safety studies” he’ll produce (retrospective from raiding the VSD and then prospective through his not-really-independent pseudoscientists) are reasonable and credible. Ultimately he wants to make billions suing vaccine makers and he’ll be more believable in that role if he occasionally angers the hardcore anti-vaxxers. He may also be pondering running for president in for 2028 so again he can’t be 100% foaming-at-the-mouth antivax. IMHO it’s money and power that drives Kennedy.
Yes, at the risk of temporarily enraging antivax followers, Junior has issued a statement which (while not actually urging parents to get their kids the MMR) positions him as pro-vaccine. He can use that ad nauseum in the future, when he and his vaccine “panel” promulgate policies to eliminate vaccination programs and seriously weaken the pediatric vaccine schedule.
Some immunization advocates, in the midst of enjoying antivaxer meltdown over RFK Jr.’s statement, seem to have missed the antivax dog whistles (I didn’t spot the “dying with measles line until Orac mentioned it) and failed to see how Junior can use his statement* as ammunition against critics in the future.
*In one of his slightly less outraged tweets, the Health Deranger suggested that most of Junior’s measles statement was written by CDC staffers. 😀
Christopher, this antivaxxer is agreeing that you’re closest to the truth about Kennedy’s ‘backpeddaling’. With the media weaponizing the outbreak against him, the last thing he needs is it interfering with the MAHA commission’s research into schedule that was promised. Better to give a tepid wink to MMR, wait for the outbreak to die out, and while it is pedal to the metal for his researchers. When the findings come out that will invariably find that vaccines are linked to autism then he will have the science to justify his moves against vaccines (insert evil grin).
Personally, if I were in Kennedy’s position, I would’ve gave the same ‘dogwhistle’ nod to MMR in lieu of the outbreak and how it is being spinned. I might also be a little bias here because, as I already explained, I think there is more to autism than just MMR. I think the full schedule is the culprit. In 100 days we should find out.
Where you guys are concerned, I also don’t think you’re so much concerned about Kennedy now ‘supporting’ the MMR. It is the MAHA research findings that you most dread, and that’s the end point of weaponizing the outbreak. It is to create such a hostile climate that Kennedy will simply give up on any effort to undermine vaccines and including canning the MAHA research. My money is on your efforts proving futile. I think Kennedy is really locked in.
It’s your repetition of Nazi reasoning on disability that I most dread.
“I think…”
No, you don’t. You seem to be incapable of it.
“Better to give a tepid wink to MMR, wait for the outbreak to die out, and while it is pedal to the metal for his researchers.”
Fred has something nearly right for once, except it should be Junior’s “researchers”, given that they’re bound to include incompetent, unethical and/or retracted antivax pseudocientists (Lyons-Weiler amd McCullough come to mind).
Pro-immunization advocates don’t worry about this kind of clown crew unearthing “smoking guns” that haven’t materialized over many decades of safe and successful vaccine use. But it’s a waste of time and energy debunking such nonsense (as in the case of the bullshit Florida Medicaid study), taking up resources that could be used to research actual causes of autism and effective prevention and treatment.
Sadly (:, malignant trolls promising “game-changing” vaccine studies out of the corrupted Trump HHS will be disappointed.
Again.
If there is no good evidence of any link between vaccines and autism in 100 days, will you admit you were wrong and say that vaccines, despite occasional minor side-effects, are better than having 500 children dying every year of measles?
Fred What about all existing studies about vaccines and autism. or about autism generally ? How do you explain them ?
Source of data was not media, or CDC, it was Texas health department. Dead children are not media hype.
Hello, you may have been asked this a few times… please present a PubMed indexed study by reputable qualified researchers (no lawyers) that the MMR vaccine used in the USA causes more harm than getting measles.
Do not mention autism because that is not just one form of disability, there are dozens between Level 1 to Level 3 (did you know about the levels). Research on genetics of autism (I included a link to one) shows there are several, and some actually have forms of treatment: https://sparkforautism.org/discover/tags/autism-genes/
By the way, one real cause of autism is Congenital Rubella Syndrome. It is prevented by getting a rubella vaccine, which is the “R” in the MMR vaccine.
Or, perhaps, Kennedy proved you wrong and demonstrated that he is not antivax, as you repeatedly alleged?
Nah. Too many obvious antivax dog whistles in this op-ed for that to be the case. I suspect that Christopher is correct and that this is PR aimed at those who don’t know his MO as well as I do as “evidence” that he’s “not antivaccine,” which also not-so-subtly shifts the narrative to more antivax framing, like “personal choice,” “dying with measles” rather than “of measles,” nutrition as a preventative, and vitamin A as a treatment. Unfortunately, a lot of people will take this at face value.
A. To add to your well-founded criticism of overhyping vitamin A, let’s look at the study he cited. https://academic.oup.com/ije/article/39/suppl_1/i48/699532?login=false
First, note that this is a study that is not just about vitamin A, but even more about the benefits of MMR. Second, here is what it found about vitamin A. “A total of 270 titles were identified for evaluation of vitamin A treatment. We included seven studies, six RCTs and one QE, in the final database for vitamin A treatment of measles46–52 (Supplementary Table 2). The Ellison study was excluded from meta-analyses due to lack of randomization and the use of a smaller dose of vitamin A (∼3000 IU) compared with the RCTs.52 A meta-analysis of the six high-quality RCTs found no significant reduction in measles mortality [RR 0.63; 95% CI (0.37–1.08)] (Table 2).46–51 However, when stratifying the analysis by vitamin A treatment dose, at least two doses of 200 000 IU for children >1 year and 100 000 IU for infants, treatment was found to reduce measles mortality (RR 0.38; 95% CI 0.18–0.81) (Figure 2).46”
In the discussion, they said: “Vitamin A deficiency is a recognized risk factor for severe measles and since 1987 the WHO and UNICEF have recommended vitamin A treatment of children with measles.70 We performed a meta-analysis of six vitamin A treatment RCTs with measles-specific mortality data and found no significant reduction in measles morality [RR 0.63; 95% CI (0.37–1.08)]. However, when stratifying the analysis by vitamin A treatment dose, at least two doses of 200 000 IU for children ≥1 year of age and 100 000 IU for infants was found to reduce measles mortality by 62% [RR 0.38; 95% CI (0.18–0.81)]. These results support the current recommendation that two doses of vitamin A be offered to children with measles.7 An exception to Rule 0 (at least 50 deaths needed) was deemed appropriate with support of CHERG due to the high quality evidence from three RCTs. As a result, a 62% effect estimate with corresponding uncertainty will be used in the LiST tool.”
Note that this is about “priority countries” – countries where there are high measles deaths, and, according to WHO, “vitamin A deficiency is common”. https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/66950/WHO_VB_01.13_Rev1-eng.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
Going from this to seeing vitamin A as an answer in the U.S. in school children is problematic. Can’t hurt, but there’s no good reason to see it as approaching the vaccine as an answer.
B. The fact that Kennedy felt a need to put out even this weak editorial, full, as you so nicely point out, with anti-vaccine dog whistles, suggests that his team at least made it clear to him that he will be held responsible for such outbreaks.
“The fact that Kennedy felt a need to put out even this weak editorial, full, as you so nicely point out, with anti-vaccine dog whistles, suggests that his team at least made it clear to him that he will be held responsible for such outbreaks.”
Or perhaps a not-so-subtle nudge from the White House to avoid a P.R. disaster.
My favorite part of the study was the statement about “measles morality” in the Results paragraph. It’s pretty clear that RFK Jr. has little or no morality when it comes to measles. Where do they get their proofreaders?
Great news! The measles outbreak is already fizzling out. Only 13 more cases over last Friday’s number. Aren’t you guys happy? We know how passionate you are about kids’ health.
Unfortunately, there is no similarly good news about autism as it continues unabated. Crunching the numbers for 5 days, we would have 9000 new cases.
That’s nearly 3000 new nonverbal kids, almost 6000 new retarded or borderline retarded kids, and close 8000 who will grow into adulthood dependent and needing constant care. Sad!
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2025/03/04/health/measles-texas-cdc-rfk-response
“That’s nearly 3000 new nonverbal kids, almost 6000 new retarded or borderline retarded kids, and close 8000 who will grow into adulthood dependent and needing constant care. Sad!”
Citation needed. Especially since autism has nothing to do with vaccines. It is a spectrum where only small percentage are as you “described.” Plus “retarded” is considered ableist.
Now where is that PubMed indexed study by reputable qualified researchers that show the present MMR vaccine causes more harm than measles?
I am not sure of the details, but on my local news station I heard that there was another statement from RFKjr about treating measles that did not mention the vaccine at all, mainly treatment with a steroid.
I am not sure of the details, but on my local news station I heard that there was another statement from RFKjr about treating measles that did not mention the vaccine at all, mainly treatment with a steroid.
“As a measles outbreak in West Texas continues to grow, the response from US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has leaned heavily on treatment with vitamin A, as well as “good results” from the use of the steroid budesonide, the antibiotic clarithromycin and cod liver oil.”
http://cnn.com/2025/03/05/health/measles-rfk-vitamin-a-misinformation/index.html
Surprising that Junior didn’t promote Vicks Vapo-Rub. And MMS supporters must be upset that he hasn’t yet recommended chlorine dioxide bleach enemas.
Another 12 measles cases reported in Texas in the last 5 days.