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Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. testifies during a Senate Finance Committee hearing. <\/span>Aaron Schwartz\/AP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n In an interview<\/span> published Friday,<\/a> Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told the New York Times <\/em>that he\u2019d personally directed the CDC to put a new page on the agency\u2019s website<\/a>, casting doubt on the fact that vaccines don\u2019t cause autism.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe whole thing about \u2018vaccines have been tested and there\u2019s been this determination made,\u2019 is just a lie,\u201d Kennedy told the Times<\/em>, lying. He added, \u201cThe phrase \u2018Vaccines do not cause autism\u2019 is not supported by science.\u201d\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n Kennedy employed confused logic in his conversation with the Times,<\/em> telling journalist Sheryl Gay Stolberg that he doesn\u2019t believe there\u2019s adequate proof to claim that vaccines don\u2019t cause autism. \u201cHe said he is not saying vaccines cause autism,\u201d Stolberg wrote. \u201cHe is simply saying there is no proof that they don\u2019t.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Kennedy also claimed that he was merely offering a more accurate look at \u201cthe state of the science,\u201d telling Stolberg, \u201cI think the way to drive up vaccine utilization, ultimately, is to be honest with people,\u201d he said, adding, \u201cMy job is not to gaslight Americans but to give them accurate information about the state of the science.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear what possible standard of evidence would satisfy Kennedy, who\u2019s been a dedicated anti-vaccine activist <\/a>since 2005. Dozens of studies both in the U.S. and internationally have made it clear that there\u2019s no link between the aluminum adjuvants in vaccines and autism, including a landmark Danish stud<\/a>y that followed 1.2 million children for 24 years. The study was published this summer in the Annals of Internal Medicine <\/em>and also found no link between vaccines and a variety of other health conditions, including asthma, allergies, and autoimmune diseases. Kennedy has baselessly called for the study to be retracted<\/a>, which he does not have the power to demand, and which the journal declined to do.\u00a0According to Nature<\/em>, the journal\u2019s editor-in-chief \u00a0Christine Laine wrote in a note on the study\u2019s webpage that retraction \u201cis warranted only when serious errors invalidate findings or there is documented scientific misconduct, neither of which occurred here.\u201d<\/p>\n Kennedy\u2019s directive has horrified CDC staffers, <\/a>one of whom told my colleague Kiera Butler, \u201cThe best way I can put it is it feels like we\u2019re on a hijacked airplane.\u201d (As Butler wrote this week, the new \u201cVaccines and Autism\u201d web page contradicts other information still available on the CDC website.) Public health experts told the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) that CDC\u2019s guidance can no longer be trusted,<\/a> creating an unprecedented challenge for Americans looking for accurate health guidance from their government.\u00a0<\/p>\n While Kennedy\u2019s version of the CDC focuses on reviving false claims about vaccines, the United States is at risk of losing its measles elimination status<\/a>. Measles cases are at their highest level in three decades, with 45 outbreaks so far this year nationwide. According to\u2014for now\u2014the CDC, <\/a>in 92 percent of those cases, the patient\u2019s vaccination status was listed as either \u201cunvaccinated\u201d or \u201cunknown.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n