When President Donald Trump appointed David Weldon, a 71-year-old doctor from Florida who has long questioned the safety of vaccines, to head the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, anti-vaccine activists said We celebrated this.
The move comes as the United States faces a resurgence of pertussis, measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases, as well as a growing threat from bird flu and chickenpox.
“He’s one of us!!” the co-chair of the anti-vaccination group Mississippi Parents for Vaccine Rights wrote on Facebook. “Our movement has always had momentum. This is a dream come true.”
“More good news every day!” wrote another prominent anti-vaxxer in West Virginia.
“Great news today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Anti-vaxxers who promote chlorine dioxide, essentially industrial bleach, to “cure” autism We announced AutismOne, an organization that will serve as a platform. The organization also gave Mr. Weldon the award in 2013.
“He’s definitely someone who is very sympathetic to the anti-vaccination cause,” said Dorit Rees, a law professor at the University of California, San Francisco School of Law.
As a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2009, Weldon was a founding member of the Congressional Autism Caucus and introduced two vaccine-related bills.
Despite evidence that low doses of thimerosal are safe, one bill would prohibit vaccinations containing thimerosal, even though by that time nearly all vaccines were already manufactured without preservatives. This will limit who can receive it.
Another bill calls for transferring the CDC’s vaccine safety work to another independent agency, a major change.
When he left the U.S. House of Representatives in 2008, Weldon suggested he was done with politics. At least politics seemed to be over. After unsuccessful primaries for the U.S. Senate in 2012 and again for the House of Representatives in 2024, Weldon returned to private practice as a physician.
Now, Mr. Weldon has been appointed to one of the most politicized institutions in the country.
However, Weldon never completely disappeared from the public eye. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Trump’s pick to lead Health and Human Services, has frequently relied on Weldon to argue that agencies like the CDC are in the hands of drug company interests. .
Weldon appeared in the anti-vaccination films Shoot ‘Em Up and Vaxed, both directed by gastroenterologist Andrew Wakefield, in which he questioned vaccines.
Weldon said he tried to slow down the CDC process investigating the link between autism and the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine. The MMR vaccine is a completely discredited theory proposed by Wakefield based on unethical research.
“It didn’t seem like we were. We were running a reliable system,” Weldon said on Vaxxed in 2016. He said the agency had “sought to omit important research and draw premature conclusions” in order to “permanently and completely close the door” on the link between the MMR vaccine and autism. However, this relationship has been repeatedly demonstrated in research.
Children’s Health Defense, an anti-vaccination group that RFK Jr. led until he ran for president last year, said officials like Weldon should focus on rare cases after vaccination, rather than holding vaccine manufacturers accountable. The federal law that provides compensation for medical complications will be repealed. Depending on each case, production of key pediatric vaccines could effectively end.
“It’s really dangerous,” Reese said. “Removing liability protections from routine childhood vaccines could cause manufacturers to withdraw from that market and children to lose access to these vaccines.”
Such measures would also make it more difficult to obtain compensation for very rare side effects, as people’s claims would have to be tried individually in court.
As health secretary, Kennedy may also replace the members of the CDC’s independent vaccine advisory committee. As CDC director, Mr. Weldon could veto recommendations from his advisers.
The CDC makes evidence-based recommendations for immunizations, including those that are routinely given during childhood. States do not have to follow the recommendations, but most states do.
Insurers would only be required to cover vaccines recommended through this process, but public health departments could lose funding to administer vaccines to the uninsured, potentially creating significant access issues. There is.
Weldon could also influence public messaging from the CDC about vaccine safety and effectiveness.
All candidates must be approved by Congress, a process that can take several months. But even if it doesn’t make it through the approval process, even being nominated to such a position can reinforce dangerous, anti-science ideas, Rees said.
“I think it gives them more legitimacy. It gives them a microphone… to express their opinions and promote this information,” Reese said.
“This sends a message that the Trump administration is willing to cooperate with the anti-vaccine movement. And I think it also sends a message that science-based decisions are not a priority.”
