In 2019, Samoa experienced a measles outbreak caused by low vaccination coverage. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s appointment to be President-elect Donald Trump’s health and human services secretary has stirred scrutiny of the outbreak.
The measles outbreak in Samoa was not “caused” by Kennedy. A tragic accident in 2018, in which two infants died from incorrectly mixed vaccines, and the controversial pause in vaccination that followed, bear primary responsibility for creating those conditions. This does not exclude the possibility that Kennedy exacerbated these existing conditions.
Kennedy’s assertion that he “had nothing to do with people not vaccinating in Samoa” is not credible. It is undermined by his direct engagement with the Samoan government on the topic of vaccines, his direct engagement with the Samoan anti-vaccine movement before, during, and after the epidemic, and his platforming of the two primary influencers advocating against vaccination in Samoa.
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