When asked hypothetically if he would vaccinate his children for measles today during a House hearing Wednesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said “probably,” but added that he does not believe people should follow his medical advice.
“My opinions about vaccines are irrelevant,” he said in response to a question from Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan of Wisconsin during the House Appropriations Committee hearing. “I don’t want to seem like I’m being evasive, but I don’t think people should be taking medical advice from me.”
When pressed, he repeated that he did not want to give advice to others.
“But that’s kind of your jurisdiction, because CDC does give advice, right?” Pocan asked. HHS oversees the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“I think what we’re going to try to do is to lay out the pros and cons, the risks and benefits, accurately as we understand them, with replicable studies,” Kennedy told me.
He declined to say whether he would vaccinate a child for chickenpox and polio.
Kennedy also testified in a separate Senate hearing on Wednesday.
Kennedy’s comments come as the United States deals with a concerning number of measles cases. The majority of the infections were reported in an outbreak in West Texas that resulted in the deaths of two children.
The number of cases in Texas alone has risen to 709, while total cases across the country have surpassed 1,000, with infections confirmed in at least 30 states.
According to health officials, nearly all of those infected in the Texas outbreak were unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. Both of the children who died were not vaccinated.
After previously downplaying the increasing number of cases and making several false and misleading claims about the safety of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, Kennedy acknowledged its efficacy in an exclusive interview with CBS News in April.
During the interview, Kennedy publicly encouraged people to get the measles vaccine, the first time he had done so since becoming HHS secretary.
“The federal government’s position, my position, is that people should get the measles vaccine,” he said. He went on to say, “The government should not be mandating those.”
Kennedy has a history of casting doubt on vaccines, despite decades of evidence that they have saved millions of people from debilitating illness or death.
