With its unscientific push to vaccinate all infants and toddlers against COVID, the agency will harm vaccine uptake for more significant diseases
In several previous articles, I argued that providing parents with accurate information about the pediatric COVID vaccine would boost confidence in all vaccines. Other doctors disagreed. Though they provided zero evidence, they felt that only way to protect routine vaccination, was to to let unvaccinated children repeatedly contract SARS-CoV-2. In their article The CDC Is Breaking Trust in Childhood Vaccination, Drs. Leslie Bienen and Tracy Høeg wrote that:
With its unscientific push to vaccinate all infants and toddlers against COVID, the agency will harm vaccine uptake for more significant diseases…The general trust deficit is more troubling than skepticism toward this particular vaccine, because it could conceivably drive down uptake of other childhood vaccines that we know are more important to children’s health, such as those against measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib).
The CDC’s latest guidelines could wind up lowering vaccination rates for truly dangerous diseases, like polio and measles.
To be clear, no American child has died of polio in my lifetime and measles last killed American children, 9 of them, in 1991. COVID meanwhile killed over 150 children in January 2021 alone. Neither Drs. Prasad nor Hoeg treated children hospitalized with COVID, and it’s worthwhile to listen to pediatricians who did. An article from September 2021 titled Every Day, Hundreds of Kids Are Getting Hospitalized With Covid-19 said:
“What we’re seeing now is extremely concerning,” said Dr. Edith Bracho-Sanchez, associate professor of pediatrics at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. “This virus is really going for the people who are not vaccinated. And among those people are children who don’t qualify for the vaccine and children and teens who qualify but are choosing not to get it.”
Dr. Mobeen Rathore, a leading pediatrician dealing with infectious disease at both UF Health and Wolfson Children’s Hospital, confirmed during Tuesday’s call that the death of a teen in St. Johns County recently was a result of COVID. And he said some kids are getting very sick. As of Tuesday, there are 14 kids at Wolfson being treated for COVID with five in the ICU. Three new child cases were admitted to the hospital on Monday.
“Kids do get sick. Kids do get hospitalized. Kids do get sick and go to the ICU get intubated, be on a ventilator and even be on ECMO which is a heart lung machine, sort of a last ditch effort to support these children. Unfortunately children do die. In fact many of you probably heard the news, there’s a 17-year-old who died in St. Johns County just in the last few days so I think we have to be very sure and understand that kids can get serious illness. And I can tell you that in the almost 18 months ending in June we had three deaths in our area in children. That’s one death every six months. And just in July and August we had four deaths in children so that’s two deaths a month.”
Rathore said in most cases, children who become sick with COVID do recover, both those who end up in the ICU are having severe problems with both their hearts and lungs. They’re damaged by the virus, and as we have learned, some don’t survive.
“Protecting our children is the most important thing we can do,” Rathore said. “I hope the future generations remember us as people who protected their children and not a group of people who put their children at risk.”
COVID hospitalized 234,000 children so far, and according to the AAP:
The largest peak was in winter 2022 during the omicron surge, with 6,527 child hospitalizations the week of Jan. 15.
Nonetheless, for the express purpose of encouraging apathy about SARS-COV-2, the virus that hospitalized 6,527 children in one week, Dr. Prasad voiced great concern about polio and measles, which infected 339 Americans combined, killing none of them, during that time period. Dr. Prasad’s article continued:
In an effort to encourage Covid-19 vaccination, the CDC may wind up lowering vaccination rates for polio and measles. Why? Because by adding Covid-19 shots to the schedule, the CDC is tacitly implying that this new vaccine is as important to kids as the combination MMR one. This is absolutely false. Measles can be a devastating childhood illness, but vaccination provides durable, sterilizing immunity. When vaccination rates are high, measles outbreaks can be averted.
A singular focus on COVID and pushing covid shots in kids, who mostly had covid (based on weak evidence/ w low yield <5% parents <5) has resulted in neglect for routine childhood immunization, which is disastrous. Many of us saw this coming.
Dr. Prasad was right about measles. However, COVID can also be a devastating childhood illness, as anyone who has internet access knows.
In these articles and Tweets, Drs. Prasad and Hoeg expressed great concern about the potential return of measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib). They warned that these diseases could be dangerous, and said that the vaccine against them are safe and effective. I completely agree.
However, Drs. Prasad and Hoeg claimed the COVID vaccine stood in the way of routine vaccination, and the CDC was to blame for suggesting it. According to Drs. Prasad and Hoeg, anyone who really wanted to protect children against polio and measles wouldn’t just advocate for those vaccines. Rather, they would advocate for the mass infection of unvaccinated children with SARS-CoV-2. In their telling, Drs. Prasad and Hoeg are the real vaccine-champions, while doctors who advocate for the pediatric COVID vaccine are “zealots”, indifferent to measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib).
Polio and measles matter so much, we need to let unvaccinated children contract COVID.
Since the pandemic, vaccine hesitancy over the mRNA “jab” spread to other vaccines
In my discussion of these sentiments, I argued the COVID vaccine wasn’t in competition with other vaccines any more than eating healthy is in competition with exercise. There is no reason children cannot receive the polio, measles, and COVID vaccines. I also noted that arguments against the COVID vaccine perfectly paralleled anti-vaccine arguments against other vaccines. Much of my writing has been devoted to showing the identical language used by “old school” and “new school” anti-vaccine doctors. By spreading misinformation about the COVID vaccine and deliberately fostering mistrust in those who suggest it, these “new school” anti-vaccine doctors are actively undermine confidence in all vaccines. They don’t seem to care at all.
As students return to school, state health departments have urged families to make sure their children are up to date on recommended vaccinations. Without these immunizations, children risk contracting preventable diseases such as measles, which has seen a resurgence in several states. However, a KFF analysis highlights that routine immunization rates for kindergarteners have not returned to pre-pandemic levels, in part due to vaccine hesitancy fueled by misinformation and partisan politics. Persistent false claims include the debunked link between vaccines and autism, which has falsely led some to believe that vaccines are more harmful than the diseases they prevent. These claims downplay the severity of measles and dismiss it as rare or harmless. They also commonly suggest delaying or skipping vaccines for children to avoid unfounded risks, despite the CDC’s evidence-based schedule. These misleading narratives erode public confidence in vaccines, fueling larger and faster outbreaks.
The vaccination rate of Florida kindergarteners has fallen to 90.6%, the lowest in over a decade, and concerned pediatricians say they are exhausted trying to combat anti-vax information – including from the state government. “It’s gotten difficult to manage,” said Dr. Lisa Gwynn, a Miami pediatrician and medical director for a mobile clinic that serves uninsured children…Since the pandemic, vaccine hesitancy over the mRNA “jab” spread to other vaccines, pediatricians say, who add that it’s becoming difficult to practice in the state.
That link leads to the minutes of a Florida pediatric society which said:
Dr. Mirza said that the drop in immunization rates is appalling and creates problems for the residency program when assigning residents for their primary care experiences advocacy. She wished that those at the State government level had an opportunity to visit a developing could see polio or see someone with SSPE because they had measles as a child, to really understand the power of vaccination.
Florida has always been “affirmatively against” COVID vaccines for children, and its Surgeon General is anti-vaxx to the core, as detailed recently by Dr. David Gorski. If Drs. Prasad and Hoeg were right, then Florida’s measles and polio vaccine rates would be just fine, and concerned pediatricians wouldn’t be saying they are exhausted trying to combat anti-vaxx information – including from the state government. Meanwhile, I can’t recall any pediatrician saying “families in my practice were eager to vaccinate their kid against measles, right up until the moment I provided accurate information about the COVID vaccine.”
However, Drs. Prasad and Hoeg weren’t just totally wrong about how to protect routine childhood vaccines, they were also phony and disingenuous regarding their concern about them. They feigned concern about measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib) to portray themselves doctors who sincerely care about vaccines. If measles returns, it will be the fault of people like me, not them. They warned us- “many of us saw this coming.”
Despite their professed concern about these diseases, Drs. Prasad and Hoeg weren’t vaccine-advocates in before the pandemic, and no one seriously believed they developed a sudden, genuine concern about them for a couple months in 2022. Everyone knew they were just grasping for more silly reasons to let unvaccinated children repeatedly contract COVID. This was their obvious goal, and they produced an overwhelming amount of material encouraging pediatric COVID infections, even before there was a pediatric COVID vaccine. This was genuine and deeply held belief.
In contrast, they never mentioned routine vaccines unless they were dunking on the pediatric COVID vaccine. Dr. Hoeg only mentioned measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib) when she was dunking on the pediatric COVID vaccine. Dr. Prasad only wrote “Measles can be a devastating childhood illness, but vaccination provides durable, sterilizing immunity” when he was dunking on the pediatric COVID vaccine. Indeed, although routine vaccines are under assault today, they make no effort to defend them. Instead of sounding the alarm bell, they speak positively about natural immunity, speculating that viruses might prevent cancer and autoimmune disease, which is exactly what anti-vaccine doctors spoke said measles before the pandemic.
My friend @RobertKennedyJr
Another obvious indication of their insincerity was that Drs. Prasad and Hoeg praised Robert Kennedy Jr. on multiple occasions. My previous article on the pathetic phenomenon of doctors sanewashing Mr. Kennedy discussed this in depth, but it’s worth repeating two key points.
First, the same doctors who were very concerned about the impact of the COVID vaccine on routine vaccination, had zero concern about Mr. Kennedy’s impact on routine vaccination. In fact, they complimented and legitimized him. Sure, they “sometimes disagree” with him, but in their telling, Mr. Kennedy is basically a reasonable guy who makes valid points and whose judgment we should trust.
Since Dr. Hoeg wants to know what she got wrong, I would say she is wrong to “like” someone whose anti-vaccine disinformation led to 83 measles deaths in Samoa, most of them children. I am friends with people who strive to provide accurate information about viruses and vaccines. They haven’t made millions of dollars lying about vaccines, and so they don’t have the blood of children on their hands.
Like Dr. Hoeg, Dr. Prasad was also eager to sanewash Mr. Kennedy. If you have not done so already, watch this video of Dr. Prasad saying Mr. Kennedy was right about his “core concern”, which was about the “corrupting influence of money”, while disparaging vaccine-hero Dr. Peter Hotez.
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This was a theme. Dr. Prasad often mocked vaccine-advocates, calling them “idiots” and claiming they are guilty of “malpractice“, while using aggressive wresting metaphors to praise and elevate Mr. Kennedy, who takes testosterone and poses shirtless.
Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill
The second thing to remember is that Mr. Kennedy is a dishonest and deluded anti-vaxxer. His organization recently produced and is now promoting the movie Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill, to pick one example amongst many. He is doing this at a time when measles is poised to make comeback and confidence in vaccines is dropping, especially in the MAGA demographic Mr. Kennedy now loudly endorses. According to a survey by KFF:
Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who support the MAGA movement are less likely than their non-MAGA counterparts to express confidence in the safety of COVID-19 vaccines (29% vs. 44%), respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, vaccines (41% vs. 61%), and flu vaccines (53% vs. 74%).
Though I confess I haven’t and won’t see this Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill, it’s obviously the rankest, vilest anti-vaxx propaganda, featuring “Deadly protocols. Tragic outcomes. Powerful testimonies“. Mr. Kennedy has been deliberately lying about vaccines for decades. He then lies about lying. As Dr. Paul Offit said:
What, exactly, has Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. accomplished? Using the platform of a famous name, he has chosen to lie about vaccines and vaccine safety, no doubt putting children in harm’s way.
Mr. Kennedy is more dangerous than ever as described by the article Alarm Grows Over Possible RFK Jr. Role at HHS if Trump Wins. However, despite their professed concern about routine vaccinations, this is who Drs. Prasad and Hoeg befriend and publicly promote.
“RFK Jr would flatten most public health experts in debate”
A COVID Silver Lining? More Parents Than Ever Questioning ‘Routine’ Childhood Vaccines.
For nearly 15 years, I have been arguing that measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib) are dangerous and the vaccines against them vital. Myself and many others have been warning about the dangers of the anti-vaccine movement for a long time. Although I doubt he knows who I am, I am very familiar with Mr. Kennedy and his tactics. I know how valuable it is for him to have credentialed “pro-vaccine” doctors repeating his talking points and elevating his reputation.
Children and teen vaccination rates began plummeting with the onset of the pandemic, and as concerns surfaced around the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, some parents also began questioning the need for the long list of other vaccines recommended by public health officials…
In the U.S., children’s and teen’s vaccination rates plummeted dramatically, falling that year by as much as 91% depending on the age group, including a noticeably lower uptake of diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis vaccines (DTaP or DTP), meningitis shots and human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines.
I never thought I’d say this about an article on Mr. Kennedy’s site, but this isn’t wrong. I find this terrifying. Mr. Kennedy, however, senses an opportunity. He is doing all he can to leverage distrust of COVID vaccines to destroy confidence in all vaccines. That’s the purpose of Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill. Mr. Kennedy already has a body count, and he’s not satisfied yet.
Beyond their harm to vaccines, paranoid, hateful movies like Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill are dangerous for another reason. They are why vaccine-advocates like Dr. Hotez get antisemitic death threats and stalked at home by enraged anti-vaxxers. Yet, instead of bemoaning the lack of civil discourse as he did in April 2020 when defending the Dr. John Ioannidis’ misinformation, Dr. Prasad is eager to pour fuel on that fire, likening public health to Nazism and suggesting that Dr. Hotez’s support for mitigation measures means he was indifferent to child sexual abuse. Despite writing that neglect for routine childhood immunization would be disastrous, this is how Dr. Prasad treats a doctor who has dedicated his life and taken great personal risk to defend routine childhood immunization.
Measles can be a devastating childhood illness, but vaccination provides durable, sterilizing immunity
Although Drs. Prasad and Hoeg claimed to be very concerned about measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib), it’s obvious they couldn’t care less about these diseases. Their “concern” was just a performance, just more bad faith engagement, just another sad example of doctors treating the pandemic as spectacle. They just wanted another excuse to dunk on the pediatric COVID vaccine.
If Drs. Prasad and Hoeg want to prove they actually care about routine vaccines, they can do what they should have done a long time ago and openly and unequivocally denounce Mr. Kennedy and his fire hose of repulsive anti-vaxx disinformation. They can remind people that measles can be a devastating childhood illness, but vaccination provides durable, sterilizing immunity. They can tell their audience to completely reject anyone, including Mr. Kennedy, who spreads dangerous disinformation about routine childhood immunizations. They can do all this without trashing the COVID vaccine or praising Mr. Kennedy for being right about his “core concern”, which has little to do with money, and everything to do with leaving children vulnerable to measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib).
And this is the easiest challenge imaginable. It’s like dunking on a hoop that’s fallen on the ground, especially for doctors who publicly declared themselves to be very concerned about the fate of routine childhood immunization. As a doctor who actually who cares about vaccines, I will never turn down an opportunity to advocate for vaccines or repudiate Mr. Kennedy. Anyone can contact me anytime for a quote. He’s more dangerous now than ever, and I’ll add, many of us saw this coming.
Presently, Drs. Prasad’s and Hoeg’s comments on Mr. Kennedy send a clear message- they don’t care at all about his odious anti-vaxx disinformation. Any doctor who says nothing when Mr. Kennedy positively amplifies their voice, is totally indifferent to the fate ofroutine childhood immunization. Any doctor who isn’t willing to clearly condemn and disavow the most prominent and influential anti-vaxxer in the U.S., obviously does not care a bit about preventing measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, and Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib).
And if you’re a doctor who has repeatedly praised Mr. Kennedy, but you’re afraidthat honestly criticizing him would damage your brand and repel your paying customers, I hope you reflect on the choices you made that to led your destination. This is who you are now- a doctor who pretends to care about vaccines while refusing to bluntly condemn the man behind Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill.
Is this really who you wanted to be?
Dr. Jonathan Howard is a neurologist and psychiatrist who has been interested in vaccines since long before COVID-19. He is the author of “We Want Them Infected: How the failed quest for herd immunity led doctors to embrace the anti-vaccine movement and blinded Americans to the threat of COVID.”
