RFK Jr. I can’t say if you have vaccinated your children today for polio

Washington – The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., could not say Wednesday if he was vaccinating his children today against polyomyelitis, the highly contagious and mortal virus that was once the main cause of paralysis among children.

During the testimony before a chamber subcommittee, representative Mark Pocan (D-Wis) asked Kennedy, who is known for spreading misinformation about vaccine safety, if he vaccinated his children today, if they were still children, against a series of preventable vaccine diseases. Pocan began with measles.

“For measles?” Kennedy said, stopping. “Probably for measles.”

“Would your son vaccinate for chickenpox?” Pocan asked.

“I don’t want to give advice,” Kennedy replied. “I can tell you that in Europe they do not use the chicken chickenpox vaccine.” (This is not true.)

What about the polio, asked Pocan, who was eliminated from the United States in 1979?

“I don’t want to give advice,” Kennedy said.

The Secretary of Health and Human Services insisted that his opinions on the vaccination of children were irrelevant for their work, which is literally shaping the health policy of the United States.

“I don’t think people should receive medical advice from me,” Kennedy said.

“Everyone can make that decision” about whether vaccinating their children, he said, and the problem with the Secretary of Health and Human Services that gives vaccines advice is that “it will seem that I am giving advice to other people and I do not want to do that.”

“But that is a kind of jurisdiction,” Pocan replied with a perplexed smile. “Because [the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an agency Kennedy oversees] gives advice. “

Photo AP/John McDonnell

He Strangely claimed That the measles vaccine “contains many debris of the aborted fetus and DNA particles,” and said falsely “”Natural immunity“ It is more effective than a vaccine to provide lasting protection against measles.

His refusal to support the polyomyelitis vaccine on Wednesday is particularly crazy. The polio causes permanent paralysis and death, and the vaccine, which occurred in the mid -1950s, has resulted in an estimate 20 million more people Being able to walk today that otherwise it would have been paralyzed. It has also prevented approximately 1.5 million children from dying.

The representative Rosa Delauro (D-Conn.), The main democrat of the committee, was visibly horrified by almost everything Kennedy was saying.

She called her views on vaccines as “Chalatanería” and torn her insertious response to the current American measles outbreak. Since January, measles cases have beat 1,000 people for the first time in 30 years and extended to at least 31 states. Three people have died, all of which were not vaccinated.

This outbreak is spreading “while selling skepticism of unfounded and dangerous vaccine, propagated lies and erroneous information,” Delauro said.

“I don’t think people should receive medical advice from me.”

– Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The two briefly selected after Kennedy’s statement that the HHS is “doing a better job on CDC today than any nation in the world to control this measles outbreak.”

Delauro was disabled with its definition of “Europe” as a comparison point. She said that “Europe” continues when in reality it refers to the regional office of the World Health Organization for Europe, which Includes 53 countries In Europe and Asia, including some with low vaccination rates that have never eliminated measles.

The United States declared measles eliminated in 2000 after a successful vaccination campaign.

“If you compare us with Western [European] Countries that we often compare ourselves, such as Britain, have not seen measles deaths this year, ”he said.

At the end of the audience, Delauro told Kennedy that it was a “tragedy” that he is not advising parents who protect their children against preventable diseases. She was baffled by her statement that people should not seek medical advice.

“HHS makes medical decisions every day. You are making medical decisions every day. You are the secretary of the HHS,” said Connecticut Democrat. “You have tremendous power over health policy.”

“I am really horrified that it will not encourage families to vaccinate their children,” he said.