Backlash has been building in the United States following a news report that links one of President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed cabinet members to an effort to revoke approval for the polio vaccine.
On Saturday, The Associated Press news agency published a statement from a spokesperson for Robert F Kennedy Jr, whom Trump has nominated to lead the Health and Human Services Department.
In the statement, Kennedy’s camp attempted to distance the nominee from a New York Times report that his lawyer Aaron Siri had petitioned to suspend approval for the life-saving vaccine.
“Mr Kennedy believes the Polio Vaccine should be available to the public and thoroughly and properly studied,” Katie Miller, Kennedy’s spokesperson, said.
But The New York Times article has raised alarm about Kennedy’s nomination to Health and Human Services, a department whose mission is to enhance the “health and well-being of all Americans”.
Kennedy, like Siri, is a vocal vaccine sceptic. In 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kennedy helped spread doubts about vaccines designed to protect against the deadly virus, calling them “shoddily tested” and potentially “deadly”.
And in 2019, when a measles outbreak killed more than 80 children in Samoa, Kennedy wrote to the Samoan prime minister implying that a “defective vaccine” could be to blame. He has also pushed conspiracy theories that link vaccination to autism, a widely debunked belief.
Kennedy has long denied being anti-vaccine, arguing instead that he simply wants to ensure vaccine safety. But members of his own family have spoken out against his track record of spreading vaccine misinformation.
A Trump ally
In the 2024 presidential race, Kennedy ran on an independent ticket, before suspending his campaign in August and throwing his support behind Trump.
Afterwards, he became a prominent Trump surrogate, appearing numerous times on the campaign trail with the Republican leader.
Trump, in turn, teased early on that he would nominate Kennedy to his administration.
“I’m going to let him go wild on health,” Trump said at an October campaign stop at Madison Square Garden in New York. “I’m going to let him go wild on the medicines.”
Trump’s decision to pick Kennedy to head Health and Human Services has raised concern in the medical community about the future of efforts to limit the spread of preventable illness.
Those concerns were amplified on Friday, with The New York Times report. The article resurfaced