The rewriting of a page on the CDC’s website to assert the false claim that vaccines may cause autism sparked a torrent of anger and anguish from doctors, scientists, and parents who say Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is wrecking the credibility of an agency they’ve long relied on for unbiased scientific evidence.
Many scientists and public health officials fear that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s website, which now baselessly claims that health authorities previously ignored evidence of a vaccine-autism link, foreshadows a larger, dangerous attack on childhood vaccination.
“This isn’t over,” said Helen Tager-Flusberg, a professor emerita of psychology and brain science at Boston University. She noted that Kennedy hired several longtime anti-vaccine activists and researchers to review vaccine safety at the CDC. Their study is due soon, she said.
“They’re massaging the data, and the outcome is going to be, ‘We will show you that vaccines do cause autism,’” said Tager-Flusberg, who leads an advocacy group of more than 320 autism scientists concerned about Kennedy’s actions.
Kennedy’s handpicked vaccine advisory committee is set to meet next month to discuss whether to abandon recommendations that babies receive a dose of the hepatitis B vaccine within hours of birth and make other changes to the CDC-approved vaccination schedule. Kennedy has claimed — falsely, scientists say — that vaccine ingredients cause conditions like asthma and peanut allergies, in …