When Rfk Jr. Was Presented With The Science On Vaccines He Said Needed To See, He Dismissed It

The man who hopes to be President Donald Trump's health secretary repeatedly asked to see "data" or 'science" showing vaccines are safe - but when an influential Republican senator did so, he dismissed it.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spent two days this week insisting to senators that he's not anti-vaccine. He said that he instead supports vaccinations and will follow the science in overseeing the 1.7 trillion Department of Health and Human Services, which, among other duties, oversees vaccine research, approval and recommendations.

But Kennedy repeatedly refused to acknowledge scientific consensus that childhood vaccines don't cause autism and that COVID-19 vaccines saved millions of lives, and he falsely asserted the government has no good vaccine safety monitoring. While appearing to ignore mainstream science, he cited flawed or tangential research to make his points, such as suggesting Black people may need different vaccines than whites.

His responses raised concern among health experts that Kennedy lacks basic skills needed for the job.

"He ignores science. He cherry-picks sometimes fraudulent studies. Sometimes he takes well-done studies and takes little pieces of them out of context," said Dr. Sean O'Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics.