Donald Trump is pushing the longtime vaccine opponent and current health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr to be more aggressive on cutting vaccines in the US ….
Trump has a long record of anti-vaccine statements, but the White House recently put a hold on vaccine changes after polling indicated they were a losing issue in the midterm elections.
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The US president hopes to make “alleviating autism” a component of his legacy … and he has taken issue with Kennedy’s less aggressive changes to vaccination recommendations in recent months.
“Donald Trump has been anti-vaccine at least since 2015,” said Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center and an infectious diseases physician at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. …
Tony Fabrizio, a top pollster for Trump, found that anti-vaccine moves are unpopular with voters in key districts, concluding in a December memo that “skepticism toward vaccine requirements is politically risky for both parties”.
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Susie Wiles gave HHS the deadline of New Year’s Eve to make vaccine changes, to allow vaccines to fall into the background with the midterms looming ….
But Trump’s priorities appear to lie elsewhere.
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“I think Donald Trump has a fixed, immutable belief that vaccines cause autism,” Offit said. That makes Trump the most powerful anti-vaxxer in the world, Offit said – and it means he is unlikely to fire Kennedy, even as rumors have swirled that the health secretary is on his way out.
