RFK Jr. To Chair Commission on Vaccine Safety

Trump has a history, on Twitter and in debates, of questioning the well-established science behind the US’ vaccination program. Thimerosal hasn’t been used in childhood vaccines in the U.S. for more than 15 years.

“Requiring vaccines before school admission has been a key component of a decades-long campaign that had almost rid the United States of some of its most severe illnesses, from the measles to whooping cough, public-health experts say”.

“Even if he doesn’t change federal policy”, Offit said, “he still is no doubt strengthening the belief some parents have that vaccines have done harm and therefore they should choose not to vaccinate their children”.

However, Trump said he is not completely against vaccines but tired of large doses.

Donald Trump has appointed Robert Kennedy Jr, to lead a commission into “vaccine safety”.

Trump first weighed in on the topic of vaccines in 2014, repeating the universally debunked claim that vaccines are somehow linked to autism.

The CDC, among many other health institutes in the US and the United Kingdom, dismissed any link between the MMR vaccine and autism, although studies are being performed to find any feasible link between the practice of vaccination and autism.

“As both a vaccine scientist and autism father, I am deeply disturbed by the appointment”, said Baylor pediatrician Peter Hotez, MD, PhD.

Because the more of a voice we give them, the more babies will die of measles, the flu, and other preventable diseases.

Just this morning, there was a story out claiming that Jared Kushner has told people privately that Trump never really believed the Obama birth-certificate skepticism he pushed in 2011. “I think it is unsafe that he is spreading misinformation about something that’s very important for public health”, Pan told the Sacramento Bee after Kennedy invited state legislators to an anti-vaccine documentary.

That Kennedy is “pro-vaccine” is a phrase he often employs when explaining why he doesn’t trust vaccines.

As more and more studies are showing the importance of vaccines to our youth, and with outdated diseases starting to appear in scarily-high numbers, it becomes more crucial than ever to become involved in politics, in whatever way we can. But keeping diseases like measles under control requires that the vast majority of children continue to get immunized.

Thimerosal is used in some vaccines for adults as a preservative, and before 2001 it was used in some childhood vaccines too.

The role of the commission is not yet clear, but it is likely it will re-examine research and try to establish a link between autism and vaccines.

These groups recommend the optimal time and vaccine for each stage of a young child’s life.

A study from California, published in 2008, looked at autism rates among children in that state before and after thimerosal was removed from vaccines.