WASHINGTON (AP) — Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s lengthy file of questioning the protection of childhood vaccinations persevered as a flash level for him Thursday throughout a affirmation listening to the place a key Republican rapidly raised issues about his views.
Sen. Invoice Cassidy, a doctor who chairs the well being committee, opened the listening to with powerful questions for Kennedy. He requested him to reject a long-discredited principle that vaccines trigger autism.
Kennedy refused to flatly achieve this.
“It’s no secret I have some reservations on your past positions on vaccines and other issues,” Cassidy instructed the nominee.
Cassidy, of Louisiana, is taken into account to be an important vote for Kennedy to be confirmed because the Trump administration’s prime well being official. He shared with Kennedy a private story about an 18-year-old girl whose liver was failing from a hepatitis an infection.
“It was the worst day of my medical career because I thought $50 of vaccines could have prevented this all.”
Cassidy famous that Kennedy’s broad reputation and identify recognition had given him a strong platform for his views on vaccines and stated Kennedy’s advocacy had led individuals to forego the COVID-19 vaccine.
He then bore into Kennedy’s views on widespread vaccines, Lyme illness and approvals for future vaccines.
“If you are approved to this position, will you say unequivocally, will you reassure mothers unequivocally and without qualification that the measles and hepatitis B vaccines do not cause autism?” Cassidy requested.
Kennedy averted answering instantly, however stated “if the data is there, I will absolutely do that.”
Then, in a uncommon present of across-the-aisle cooperation, Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont impartial, adopted up on Cassidy’s line of questioning.
Once more, Kennedy refused to offer a definitive reply.
The Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention recommends infants obtain doses of the hepatitis vaccination.
In his opening remarks, Kennedy as soon as once more rejected the “anti-vaccine” label and as a substitute stated he’s “pro-safety.” He repeated most of the identical strains he supplied to the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday.
Sanders, the senior minority occasion member on the committee, pressed Kennedy to concede that well being care was a human proper, as his father, Robert F. Kennedy, and his uncles, John F. Kennedy and Edward Kennedy, had achieved. Kennedy once more didn’t give a definitive reply.
Kennedy needs to steer the $1.7 trillion company that oversees well being care protection — Medicare, Medicaid and the Inexpensive Care Act market — for roughly half the nation, approves then recommends vaccines for lethal illnesses and conducts security inspections of meals and hospitals.