Former Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (Photo: Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
The prospect of having vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in charge of the nation’s health policy has doctors speaking out to oppose his confirmation as U.S. Health and Human Services secretary.
The Committee to Protect Health Care says it has more than 15,000 signatures on a letter opposing Kennedy’s confirmation, including 400 from North Carolina physicians.
Three North Carolina doctors told reporters Thursday they are asking U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, to vote against Kennedy. Tillis is a member of the Senate Finance Committee, which is expected to hold a confirmation hearing on Kennedy.
Tillis’s office did not respond to an email Thursday afternoon.
Kennedy has promoted the false claim that vaccines cause autism and has suggested that recreational drugs or environmental toxins cause AIDS.
A lawyer helping Kennedy pick health officials wants the government to revoke approval of the polio vaccine, the New York Times reported.
Doctors are concerned about Kennedy’s “dangerous misinformation about vaccines and his efforts to undermine immunizations,” said Dr. Rachel Brown, an Asheville neonatologist.
Having Kennedy as the nation’s health secretary will put doctors in the position of needing to counter misinformation coming from a government source, she said.
Vaccination rates are already dropping, putting the most vulnerable people at risk, said Dr. Frank Spence of Elkin.
“If RFK becomes HHS secretary, we fear vaccination rates would plummet even further, leading to a resurgence of preventable diseases like measles and polio,” he said. “In fact, members of his team have already launched an offensive against polio vaccine.”
Vaccines are the best first line of defense against preventable diseases, Spence said. “Undermining the effectiveness of vaccines or the need for immunizations goes against the best interests of public health and personal safety and wellbeing.”
As HHS secretary, Kennedy would oversee the CDC, the FDA, the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and more than a half dozen other health and research offices.