Vaccinations have provided significant protection for the public against infectious diseases. However, there was a modest decrease in support in 2023 nationwide for vaccine requirements for children to attend public schools.
In addition, the presidential candidacy of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a leading critic of childhood vaccination, has given him a prominent platform in which to amplify his views. This includes an extensive interview on the “Joe Rogan Experience,” a podcast with over 14 million subscribers. Notably, former President Donald Trump has said he is opposed to mandatory school COVID-19 vaccinations, and in a phone call Trump apparently wasn’t aware was being recorded, he appeared to endorse Kennedy’s views toward vaccines.
I am a biochemist and molecular biologist studying the roles microbes play in health and disease. I also teach medical students and am interested in how the public understands science.
Here are some facts about vaccines that skeptics like Kennedy get wrong:
Vaccines are effective and safe
Public health data from 1974 to the present conclude that vaccines have saved at least 154 million lives worldwide over the past 50 years. Vaccines are also constantly monitored for safety in the U.S.
Nevertheless, the false claim that vaccines cause autism persists despite study after study of large populations throughout the world showing no causal link between them.
Claims about the dangers of vaccines often come from misrepresenting scientific research papers. Kennedy cites a 2005 report allegedly showing massive brain inflammation in monkeys in response to vaccination, when in fact the authors of that study state that there were no serious medical complications. A separate 2003 study that Kennedy claimed showed a 1,135% increase in autism in vaccinated versus unvaccinated children actually found no consistent significant association between vaccines and neurodevelopmental outcomes.
Kennedy also claims that a 2002 vaccine study included a control group of children 6 months of age and younger who were fed mercury-contaminated tuna sandwiches. This claim is false.
Vaccines are continuously monitored for safety before and long after they’re available to the general public.
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Aluminum adjuvants help boost immunity
Kennedy is co-counsel with a law firm that is suing the pharmaceutical company Merck based in part on the unfounded assertion that the aluminum in one of its vaccines causes neurological disease. Aluminum is added to many vaccines as an adjuvant to strengthen the body’s immune response to the vaccine, thereby enhancing the body’s defense against the targeted microbe.
The law firm’s claim is based on a 2020 report showing that brain tissue from some patients with Alzheimer’s disease, autism and multiple sclerosis have elevated levels of aluminum. The authors of that study do not assert that vaccines are the…
