Kennedy Launches Review of Vaccines’ Possible Role in Chronic Disease

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is spearheading an intense push across health agencies under his purview for government scientists and federal data contractors to examine his theory that vaccines are helping to fuel an epidemic of chronic disease.

The New York Times reported. Kennedy has said little publicly about vaccines in recent months at the behest of a White House worried that his unpopular stance will hurt Republicans in November’s midterm elections.

But he has not abandoned his quest for evidence that they are unsafe. Working behind the scenes, he sees vaccines as a “potential culprit” in various neurological and autoimmune disorders, including asthma and allergies. The current research effort resurrects research into whether vaccines are linked to autism.

It also resurrects research into whether thimerosal is dangerous. Thimerosal has largely been removed from vaccines in the United States but remains in some flu shots. The effort is being led by Martin Kulldorff, a biostatistician and vaccine safety expert who is now the health department’s chief science and data officer.

Career scientists at the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are conducting the research. Contractors who provide statistical expertise and access to millions of patient medical records are conducting the research alongside FDA and CDC scientists.

The initiative was described to The New York Times by six people who are close to it, all of whom insisted on anonymity because it is not public.

Kennedy. Those critics have long accused the secretary of cherry-picking data and misinterpreting studies to claim that vaccines are unsafe and to limit their use.

They fear Mr. Kennedy will use the findings to further erode confidence in vaccines. The World Health Organization estimates saved 154 million lives over the past half-century by vaccines.