Richard Besser criticizes Trump’s health secretary pick, and says falsely linking vaccines to autism is a ‘cruel thing to do’

The former acting director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has criticized Robert F Kennedy Jr’s nomination by Donald Trump as secretary of the country’s health and human services (HHS), calling his false vaccine theories “cruel”.

In a new interview on ABC, Richard Besser, who led the CDC during Barack Obama’s administration, called Kennedy’s push to falsely link vaccines to autism a “cruel thing to do”, adding, “There are things we do for our own health, but there are things we do that are good for ourselves, our families and our communities and vaccination falls into that category.”

“Having someone who denies that in that role is extremely dangerous,” Besser said about Kennedy.

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  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
    5·
    2 days ago

    Kennedy will have some fun as an antivaxxer in that job. I just read that avian flu H5N1 has been spotted in sus scrofa (pigs), which is a perfect stepstone to crossbreed it with human viruses. And that could mean party.

    Having a terminal idiot in the medical driver seat is a sure recipe for disaster.

  • _bcron_@lemmy.worldEnglish
    32·
    4 days ago

    Not to mention how fallacious it is for someone to claim that vaccination is bad for everyone on the basis that they have been lead to believe bad for women that are or could become pregnant.

    It’s about as sensible as saying no one should eat shellfish because some people have allergies.

    Let’s say, hypothetically, vaccines always cause autism. If someone is truly concerned about the health of newborns would they not want all who cannot or will not reproduce to be vaccinated in order to lessen the risk of infection of communicable disease?