Kennedy’s Quiet Hunt for Autism Culprits Stalls as Trump Orders Baseless Changes to Childhood Shots
The Trump administration is working to implement the president’s new order on childhood vaccines, which he publicly faulted for a rise in autism — even as health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s closed-door research has yet to produce evidence linking them.
President Donald Trump has directed a reduction in childhood vaccinations, attributing an increase in autism cases to the shots, despite the nation's leading health official, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., failing to provide evidence linking vaccines to the disorder. The directive, released on August 10, came less than three months before midterm elections, prompting concerns from medical groups, doctors, and political analysts about potential damage from anti-vaccine rhetoric.
This move highlights Trump's impatience for his health secretary to deliver on a promise of identifying a cause for the surge in autism diagnoses. Kennedy and his anti-vaccine allies have missed a deadline to deliver definitive answers in a secretive, multimillion-dollar research project, leaving Trump to rely on debunked theories while publicly criticizing vaccines.
Helen Tager-Flusberg, a renowned autism researcher, criticized the secrecy surrounding Kennedy's efforts, comparing the project to the opaque Manhattan Project of the 1940s. The White House has not disclosed the research informing Trump's opinions or which vaccines he suspects of causing autism. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) stated that the president's action is based on reassessing the nation's vaccine schedule and recommended reducing childhood immunizations based on peer countries' guidance, but no other country has followed suit in removing the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine.
Despite decades of research indicating that genetics play a significant role in autism, Kennedy has rejected this science and claimed that autism is a "preventable disease." He has allocated millions of taxpayer dollars to a research effort that has offered little transparency or involvement from prominent autism advocacy groups or federal scientists.
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