WASHINGTON (AP) – Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, a childhood polio survivor, says President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees seeking confirmation should “avoid” efforts to discredit the polio vaccine. He said that.
“Efforts to undermine public trust in proven treatments are not only uninformed, they are dangerous,” McConnell said in a statement Friday. “Those seeking the Senate’s consent to serve as the next administration would be wise to avoid even linking themselves to such efforts.”
The 82-year-old lawmaker’s statement appeared to be aimed at President Trump’s nominee for secretary of health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., after one of his advisers launched a petition to rescind the approval of the 2022 polio vaccine. This was in response to reports that he had submitted the request. It suggests President Kennedy, who has long promoted the debunked idea that vaccines cause autism, may soon face resistance in the Republican-controlled Senate.
“Mr. Kennedy believes that the polio vaccine should be made available to the public and thoroughly and properly studied,” Kennedy transition press secretary Katie Miller said in response to questions.
The New York Times reported on Friday that lawyers helping President Kennedy select nominees for health officials have called for revoking the approval of the polio vaccine, which is widely believed to have stopped the polio vaccine epidemic in most parts of the world. It is reported that a petition has been submitted to the government. Pausing distribution of several other vaccines. The Washington Post also granted the petition. The Associated Press has not independently verified the petition filed in 2022, the paper said.
Vaccines have been proven safe and effective in clinical trials and in real-world use over decades, and are considered one of the most effective public health measures in history.
McConnell contracted polio at the age of two, but survived thanks to a “miraculous combination of modern medicine and a mother’s love,” she said Friday. He praised the “saving power” of the polio vaccine for “the millions of people who came after me.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer also responded to the Times report on Friday. In a post on X, formerly Twitter, he said, “It’s no secret that those in the Trump transition are trying to dismantle the polio vaccine that virtually eradicated polio in the United States and saved millions of lives. It’s outrageous and dangerous.”
He asked Kennedy to clarify his position on that.
President Trump nominated Kennedy last month, saying he would work to protect Americans from “harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceuticals, and food additives.”
But Mr. Kennedy’s nomination quickly alarmed scientists and public health officials, who feared he would abandon life-saving public health efforts such as vaccines.
President Kennedy claimed other conspiracy theories about the vaccine, including that COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to save Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people, but his comments were taken out of context. President Kennedy later said that he had been ignored. He has repeatedly brought up the Holocaust when discussing vaccines and public health mandates.
If confirmed, Kennedy said he would reshape the Department of Health and Human Services, a government agency with vast scope and a $1.3 trillion budget. He has suggested that the Food and Drug Administration is beholden to “big drug companies,” and his anti-vaccine nonprofit is calling on the Food and Drug Administration to halt the use of coronavirus vaccines.
During the COVID-19 outbreak, his nonprofit organization Children’s Health Defense petitioned the FDA to halt the use of all coronavirus vaccines. The group says the agency benefits from “big drug companies” because much of its budget comes from industry fees and some employees who leave the agency go on to work for drug companies. claims.
Children’s Health Defense has now taken steps to identify misinformation, including information about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines, to multiple news organizations, including The Associated Press. A lawsuit is currently pending against the company for violating antitrust laws. Kennedy took a leave of absence from the group when he announced his presidential bid, but is listed as one of the group’s lawyers in the lawsuit.
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