RFK, Jr.'s anti-vaccine campaign is reckless and wrong -- say three Kennedys [View all]

OF ALL THE WRINKLES in the emerging measles crisis and spotlight it has put on families who have caused the outbreak by refusing to vaccinate their children, the most curious has been the leading role of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The third child and namesake of Robert Kennedy has spent years promoting the debunked idea that vaccines can cause autism in children. He has fanned the flames of conspiracy theorists and true-believers of assorted wacky claims to provide justification for the anti-vaxxer movement that shuns immunizations.

While Kennedy has been roundly criticized for years by leading voices in medicine and public health, his views come in for a harsh rebuke today from three people who know him well — two of his siblings and a niece who directs an initiative on global health. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Joseph P. Kennedy II, and Maeve Kennedy McKean pen a commentary piece for Politico ripping Robert Kennedy Jr.’s role in stirring the anti-vaccine movement.

The surge of measles cases in the US — over 700 cases so far — and the more than 100,000 annual deaths globally from the disease “are caused by the growing fear and mistrust of vaccines—amplified by internet doomsayers,” they write. Their brother and uncle, write the trio, “is part of this campaign to attack the institutions committed to reducing the tragedy of preventable infectious diseases. He has helped to spread dangerous misinformation over social media and is complicit in sowing distrust of the science behind vaccines.”

Read more: https://commonwealthmagazine.org/health-care/rfk-jr-s-anti-vaccine-campaign-is-reckless-and-wrong-say-three-kennedys-2/