Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), chairman of the Senate Health Committee, issued a strong statement in support of vaccines on Thursday after a controversial change was made to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention‘s website, which pushed back against the claim that vaccines do not cause autism.
The website change on Wednesday evening elicited uproar from the public health establishment, which has long held that vaccines do not cause autism. However, Cassidy’s statement did not directly reference the CDC website change, nor did it openly criticize Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
However, it did stress his experience as a physician who has treated patients with vaccine-preventable diseases, particularly liver disease, which is preventable with the hepatitis B vaccine.
“What parents need to hear right now is vaccines for measles, polio, hepatitis B and other childhood diseases are safe and effective and will not cause autism,” Cassidy posted on X. “Any statement to the contrary is wrong, irresponsible, and actively makes Americans sicker.”
Vaccines have been a challenging matter for Republicans since Kennedy’s confirmation.
Cassidy provided a crucial vote in favor of Kennedy’s confirmation in part because Kennedy pledged not to change the CDC website to articulate a possible connection between vaccines and autism.
The website now notes that the subject heading “Vaccines do not cause autism” is still displayed, even though the rest of the text raises the possibility that vaccines cause autism, “due to an agreement with the chair of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee that it would remain on the CDC website.”
Kennedy has been a strong proponent of the position that vaccines, or exposure to certain ingredients in vaccines, have caused the rise in autism cases since the 1980s.
In recent months, President Donald Trump has been a vocal supporter of several anti-vaccine talking points, such as his desire to “break up” the measles, mumps, and rubella, or MMR, vaccine and delay the infant dose of the hepatitis B vaccine to age 12.
However, the matter has sharply divided Senate Republicans, particularly those from medical backgrounds, who hold a more moderate stance.
Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-WY), also a physician, said on Thursday that he had not yet seen the CDC message because he was attending the funeral of former Vice President Dick Cheney, but he reaffirmed his support for vaccines.
Public health experts have decried the announcement as an affront to the decades of scientific research that have been spent on bolstering vaccine confidence following the publication of the seminal 1998 paper, since retracted, that found a connection between vaccines and autism.
Dr. Peter Hotez, a vaccine scientist and professor at the Texas Medical Center, called the website change “outright health disinformation.”
Hotez’s daughter was diagnosed with autism in 1994 at the age of 19. In 2018, he wrote the book Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel’s Autism about his experience as a father of a child with autism as well as a vaccine scientist, stressing the role of genetics in autism’s development.
“They’re lying to the American people,” Hotez posted on X following the CDC website change. “We have massive evidence showing vaccines don’t cause autism, and what’s more there’s no plausible mechanism given what we’ve learned about >100 autism genes in early fetal brain development.”
Cassidy’s statement on Thursday also alleged that the Trump administration has thwarted research into the complex causes of autism, including genetics and epigenetics.
“It’s deeply troubling that, according to HHS officials, they appeared to have canceled hundreds of millions in research on autism genetics,” Cassidy posted. “Redirecting attention to factors we definitely know DO NOT cause autism denies families the answers they deserve.”
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), an active supporter of Kennedy and the broader “Make America Healthy Again” movement, praised the move on X on Wednesday evening.
“Time to apologize to Dr. Andrew Wakefield and all the others who were maligned and vilified for simply asking the right questions,” Johnson posted, referring to the author of the 1998 paper.
Earlier this month, Johnson was a featured speaker at the annual conference for Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine advocacy group established by Kennedy.
CHD also took to social media to laud the new position from the CDC, calling it the “biggest public health reversal in our lifetimes.”
