An interview with Robert Kennedy Jr. on vaccines
In the early days of 2017, proponents of vaccination were deeply concerned. Donald Trump, who has long espoused a debunked link between vaccines and autism, was set to enter the White House. He met with environmental activist Robert Kennedy Jr., who has for years argued that vaccines can cause a range of developmental and other health conditions. Kennedy emerged to report he’d been asked to chair a commission into vaccine safety.
But seven months later, no such commission has been appointed and the crisis-mired White House has declined to say whether the plan has been shelved.
STAT contacted Kennedy to see where plans stood. He would only speak on condition that STAT publish the interview in a Q&A format. He argued that his assertions — which are disputed as a misreading of the scientific literature by many mainstream scientists — have been misquoted and misrepresented in the media.
Here is STAT’s conversation with Kennedy. It has been lightly edited, for length and readability.
