Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary presents a clear and present danger to public health on multiple fronts.

He recently removed all 17 members of the esteemed Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in a “clean sweep” and replaced them with handpicked proxies. The first official committee meeting last week shows how Kennedy and his lackeys are threatening preventive health care. Three of the new members oppose using mRNA in vaccines, two have been witnesses in lawsuits against vaccine makers and one served on the board of the nation’s oldest anti-vaccine group, according to the Washington Post.

The new panelists’ first shocking recommendation and discussions have received justifiable censure from the medical science community. Last week, at the formal meeting, all but one of the seven new advisory panelists recommended pulling flu vaccines that contain thimerosal, which Kennedy and the anti-vax movement falsely link to autism. Thimerosal has not been used in most childhood vaccines for over 20 years and remains in only one flu vaccine.

Scientific studies have thoroughly debunked the connection between the preservative and autism, but the accusation has been one of Kennedy’s pet causes. Only one panelist, Dr. Cody Meissner, a pediatrician with Dartmouth’s School of Medicine, dissented, saying, “The risk from influenza is so much greater than the nonexistent risk, as far as we know, from thimerosal.” While the impact of this particular vote will be slight in the United States, it shows that the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices as a body is willing to defer to Kennedy’s anti-vax, anti-science ideology.

Also shocking was Kennedy’s invitation to include Lyn Redwood — the former leader of Children’s Health Defense, the very anti-vaccine group Kennedy started — as an expert speaker before the panel. Redwood insisted that thimerosal is toxic. The New York Times reports that scientific evidence of thimerosal’s safety was posted last Tuesday by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists, then removed.

Among other concerning developments at the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices meeting was a proposal by panel chair Martin Kulldorf, an epidemiologist who opposed the Covid-19 vaccine mandates, to review the entire childhood immunization schedule at a future meeting. Another panelist, Retself Levi, drew criticism from observers for raising concerns about clesrovimab, a monoclonal antibody (not a vaccine) approved by the FDA earlier this month that protects infants from R.S.V. infection, the leading cause of infant hospitalization. Fortunately, the new antibody was narrowly approved.

Shockingly, after a CDC advisor speaking before the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices panel documented that 250 U.S. children died during the last flu season, the highest number in a nonpandemic year for some time, panelist Dr. Robert Malone called that “a modest number.”

Also shocking, the panel did not even discuss the fall Covid booster, and it is not on the agenda for its next meeting in October. It is unclear what this means for the rollout of a Covid booster. In late May, Kennedy recklessly announced the CDC is no longer recommending the updated Covid vaccine for healthy children, adults who are not senior citizens and even for pregnant women, despite their serious increased risks. He demanded that booster shots for Covid go through unnecessary, time-consuming placebo-controlled clinical trials before approval, which is expected to delay their release.

The advisory panel is charged with reviewing the childhood vaccination schedule. Critics contend many on the new panel seem unaware of how the Vaccine for Children program runs, which provides free immunizations for about half of all U.S. children. Medicaid and insurance companies are required to cover CDC-recommended vaccines, and states base school mandates on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices’ recommendations, giving the panel recommendations enormous power.

In response to the firings of the 17 seated committee members earlier this month, the physician overseeing surveillance of viruses resigned last week, warning that “people are going to die” as a result. Dr. Fiona Havers wrote colleagues: “I no longer have confidence that these data will be used objectively or evaluated with appropriate scientific rigor to make evidence-based vaccine policy decisions.”

The 17 removed committee members wrote in an article published by JAMA: “We are deeply concerned that these destabilizing decisions, made without clear rationale, may roll back the achievements of U.S. immunization policy, impact people’s access to lifesaving vaccines, and ultimately put U.S. families at risk of dangerous and preventable illnesses.”

As FFRF has continually pointed out, Kennedy’s worldview has been worrisome on various fronts. Cases of measles, one of the most contagious diseases in existence, continue to climb in the United States. Bird flu remains a threat at home and abroad. The virtual dissolution of USAID is already killing South Africans who can no longer obtain medicines against HIV/AIDS. PEPFAR, started under Republican President George W. Bush, is credited with saving 26 million lives, and now that its “soft diplomacy” outreach program has ended, 1.6 million could die unnecessarily within a year. Not only AIDS but tuberculosis, polio, Ebola and other mostly contained diseases could break out — also endangering American health in our global society. Last week, Kennedy cruelly announced the United States is pulling its support from Gavi, a vaccine alliance including WHO, UNICEF, the Gates Foundation and the World Bank that is credited with saving 18 million lives. The United States has been one of its major supporters, and Kennedy’s announcement revokes then-President Biden’s pledge of $1 billion through 2030.

It is intolerable that the fate of vaccination policies at this critical time is in the hands of a deluded fraudster who has thrown his support to a Christian nationalist agenda.

“The Freedom From Religion Foundation encourages everyone who values medical science over unfounded conspiracy theories to speak up in opposition to Kennedy’s malevolent policies,” says Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF co-president.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to promoting the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters of nontheism. With more than 42,000 members, FFRF advocates for freethinkers’ rights. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

Photo by Spencer Davis on Unsplash

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