The recent outbreaks of measles in the United States must be vigorously combated by public health officials at all levels of government—local, state, and federal. But the chief federal health official—Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.—is a vaccine skeptic who therefore cannot be trusted to lead the fight against a disease almost entirely preventable with vaccines. He should be replaced with someone who not only has a background in medicine and public health, but who also believes in modern medicine as well.
In 2000, the United States gained measles elimination status, but in the last year, outbreaks produced 1912 confirmed measles cases, and the number of confirmed cases is expected to increase in 2026. Yet measles is also entirely preventable. One shot of the measles vaccine is 93% effective, and the recommended two shots are 97% effective.
Unfortunately, current HHS Secretary Kennedy has a long record of making bizarre criticisms of vaccines. He has, for years, claimed that vaccines cause autism, despite the lack of any supporting evidence. And as I wrote in “Tales of Bobby and Anne” in 2022, Kennedy opposed anti-COVID measures and “told an anti-vax rally that we were in greater danger from supporters of mask and vaccine mandates than Europeans were at the hands of Hitler, ‘Even in Hitler’s Germany…you could cross the Alps into Switzerland. You could hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.’”
No doubt the Europeans under Nazi rule—especially the families of the 6 million Jews and 5 million Gentiles murdered in the Nazi concentration camps, as well as the millions killed in fighting and by bombings—would have disagreed with Bobby’s assessment of their safety. And, by the way, Anne Frank also died at Bergen-Belsen of Nazi-induced typhus. So much for her safety as well. To be fair, it must be added that Kennedy did try to apologize and walk back his remarks, but only after an intense public backlash in which one of his sisters declared “Bobby’s lies and fee-mongering … were both sickening and destructive.” Even Bobby’s own wife, actress Cheryl Hines (“Curb Your Enthusiasm”), called his remarks “reprehensible and insensitive.”
Yet despite Kennedy’s wild, irrational, and unsupported claims about vaccines, President Trump appointed him to be HHS Secretary, apparently as a reward for Kennedy’s support of Trump’s presidential bid, as well as because Trump may have liked the idea of having a Kennedy on his side and in his administration.
And most Senate Republicans voted to confirm Kennedy, too. Even Louisiana’s Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician who should have known better, reluctantly voted to confirm Kennedy in exchange for Kennedy’s promise to moderate his anti-vaccine views.
But with the return of measles, we can’t afford to wait any longer for Kennedy to become rational. In the 1950s, before the development of a measles vaccine, the average annual number of measles cases was about 500,000, with about 500 actually dying from the disease each year, too. To discourage vaccinations now may cause the return of thousands of cases and hundreds of deaths each year, despite the proven effectiveness of the measles vaccine.
The appointment of Kennedy to lead HHS was one of President Trump’s worst decisions. To save future lives, Trump should reverse that decision by replacing Kennedy with an official—preferably a physician or a public health expert—who understands that vaccines in general, and the measles vaccine in particular, can save rather than take lives. It’s time to return due consideration for the public health to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville since 1987 and taught politics and government at Tarleton for 36 years, retiring in 2023. His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990-2024). He was Mayor pro-tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Stephenville
Economic Development Authority since 2018, and as chair of the Erath County Appraisal District’s Appraisal Review Board since 2015. He is also a member of the Stephenville Rotary Club, the Board of Vestry of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, and the Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts’ Pecan Valley District. Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.
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