Donald Trump signed a decree on Monday August 10 containing new recommendations on vaccines, calling for spacing out their administration to children, and repeatedly making a link with autism when presenting the text.
Medical research has never established a link between autism and vaccination, but the American president and his Minister of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr continue to suggest that there could be one.
“Decades ago, children received only a small fraction of the vaccines required today. Back then people were much healthier and, of course, the high rate of autism that we see today did not exist,” said Donald Trump, for example, in the Oval Office, where he mentioned this neurodevelopmental disorder several times. “We don’t know” what causes autism, he admitted.
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The American president spoke of injections “the size of a soda bottle” which would be administered to children in the United States, without providing details on this incredible comparison. The text also recommends separating vaccines against measles, rubella and mumps in particular, instead of administering them in one injection, Donald Trump said. The ministry will thus set up a working group responsible for offering these vaccines in individual form “by collaborating with the private sector and other countries, where appropriate”.
Worst measles epidemic in 35 years
In a conference call with reporters, Andrew Racine, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), estimated that it would take more than a decade to develop separate vaccines approved in the United States. “We recommend continuing to give children a vaccine whose safety is supported by decades of data,” added Aaron M. Milstone of the AAP.
The federal government, not having the authority to make decisions directly on vaccines, is content to advise American states to review compulsory vaccinations for attending schools.
This decree signed Monday comes at a time when millions of children will return to school in the country, which is experiencing its worst measles epidemic in 35 years.
Known for his anti-vaccine positions, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., since his appointment as Minister of Health, has initiated a broad review of vaccines, some of which have been used for decades, overhauled the pediatric vaccination schedule and cut funding for the development of new vaccines, all measures strongly condemned by the medical and scientific community.
Earlier in the year, the American justice system suspended the overhaul of American vaccine policy that he had initiated. Several caregiver associations then claimed that these new measures were illegal. “The Trump administration’s proposed changes to the childhood immunization schedule illustrate the risks of allowing government recommendations to take pride of place in medical decision-making,” Jeffrey Singer of the Cato Institute said in a statement.
With AFP
