Despite a mountain of scientific evidence concluding there's no link between autism and vaccines, noted anti-vaccine figure and health secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. is trying to double down on the long-debunked theory.
As the Washington Post reports, fellow anti-vaccine crackpot David Geier — who has published articles claiming that mercury in vaccines is tied to autism, and was previously reprimanded by state authorities in Maryland for practicing medicine without a license — is joining Kennedy's department as a "senior data analyst" to work on a study once again examining the topic of autism and vaccines.
It's yet another sign that the Trump administration is chasing conspiracy theories to undermine the country's vaccination efforts, a dangerous game that could result in an escalation of health crises down the road.
The optic are particularly poor given the ongoing outbreak of measles in numerous states, an extremely preventable respiratory disease for which we've had highly effective vaccines for decades. Kennedy had already misled parents into overusing Vitamin A, leading to liver damage and yellowed skin in children.
Geier's reported involvement with the health department has terrified public health experts.
"If we increase vaccine hesitancy and immunization rates go down further, we will see more vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks," Duke Global Health Institute director Christopher Beyrer told the New York Times. "That’s how it works."
Meanwhile, Kennedy described the fellow anti-vaxxer, who holds a bachelor's degree in biology and no medical degree, as a "brilliant, extremely knowledgeable researcher with deep expertise on mercury."
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been ordered to kick off a large-scale study to reexamine long-debunked links between vaccines and autism. To experts, that's a massive waste of resources that flies in the face of scientific evidence.
Despite Kennedy endorsing Geier's research for many years, scientists have long discredited his findings, as the NYT reports. To date, there simply isn't any convincing scientific evidence linking vaccines and autism.
"The committee concludes that the evidence favor rejection of a causal relationship between [measles, mumps, and rubella] vaccine and autism," the Institute of Medicine wrote in a 2004 review of a purported link between vaccines and autism.
In short, Geier isn't just a poor pick for the job; he could prove extremely dangerous with any meaningful amount of influence inside the federal government.
"To me, the big shame is that with budget cuts, we are not ramping up research into what is actually causing autism," former head of the Washington office of the CDC Edward Hunter told the NYT. "And if you are worried about vaccine-preventable disease, this is such a clear setback."
More on Kennedy: Parents Followed RFK Jr’s Crackpot Advice and Had to Send Their Kids to the Hospital With Yellowed Skin
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