The whole “vaccines cause autism” lie was the gateway drug for like three generations of dangerous wingnuttery. Robert Kennedy Jr. was an early adopter of the lie, and that was the beginning of his larger anti-vaccine movement which has left thousands of dead people in its wake. Now Kennedy is Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary, and Kennedy is using the office to cancel flu shot research and encourage the spread of measles. On Wednesday, Kennedy gave a speech about autism which was full of dangerous lies and misinformation.
In remarks laced with scientific inaccuracies, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, said on Wednesday that autism was preventable while directly contradicting researchers within his own agency on a primary driver behind rising rates of the condition in young children.
Mr. Kennedy made his comments at a news conference, responding to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that rates of autism had increased to one in 31 among 8-year-olds, continuing a long-running trend. Blaming environmental risk factors for the uptick, he accused the media and the public of succumbing to a “myth of epidemic denial” when it came to autism. He also called research into the genetic factors that scientists say play a vital role in whether a child will develop autism “a dead end.”
“Genes don’t cause epidemics,” he said. “You need an environmental toxin.” Mr. Kennedy vowed that under his leadership, the health department would focus on looking into certain substances, like mold and food additives, and parental obesity to try to reverse rising rates of autism in children.
“These are kids who, many of them, were fully functional and regressed because of some environmental exposure into autism when they’re 2 years old,” he said. Scientists have not ruled out the possibility that both genes and environmental factors could influence whether a child develops autism. Still, there is no evidence to suggest that autism can be avoided, and researchers immediately criticized the suggestion. Dr. Eric Fombonne, who is a longtime autism researcher and professor emeritus at Oregon Health & Science University, called Mr. Kennedy’s claim “ridiculous.”
“Autism is not an infectious disease. So there aren’t preventive measures that we can take,” said Dr. Joshua Anbar, an assistant teaching professor at Arizona State University who helped collect data for the C.D.C. report.
Though Mr. Kennedy did not specifically mention vaccines in his remarks on Wednesday, he has previously sought to tie childhood vaccinations to rising rates of autism. Dozens of studies have failed to establish a link between autism and vaccines. Nevertheless, the health department recently hired a discredited vaccine skeptic to examine the theory.
Beyond the dangerous lies and bad science, Kennedy used his platform to engage in sweeping ableism towards people with autism, saying outright that autistic people can’t work, earn a living or pay taxes, and that autistic people and children are burdens on society. It’s perfectly clear (to me) where all of this is heading.
RFK JR: And these are kids who will never pay taxes, they’ll never hold a job, they’ll never play baseball, they’ll never write a poem. They’ll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted pic.twitter.com/8T3hcYYn9O
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 16, 2025
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images, Backgrid.
