Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr has released his “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) report, and experts have warned that its contents, particularly in relation to vaccines and autism, could have major implications on public health.
The report lays out significant changes Kennedy Jr. intends to implement to reduce the prevalence of chronic disease in children, transforming America’s food, health and scientific systems.
It has also taken a jab at the current immunization schedule followed in the country, saying that it requires further investigation to determine its safety and advisability.
“Secretary Kennedy has pledged radical transparency to the American public. This means being honest and straightforward about what we know — and what we don’t know — about medical products, including vaccines,” a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) spokesperson told Newsweek.
The U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, deemed the report “another historic milestone for our country,” while Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin said, “the MAHA strategy outlines the keys to success from pro-growth policies that advance research and drive innovation to private sector collaboration and increased public awareness.”
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said, “For too long, health care has used a reactive approach to chronic diseases. I am pleased to support the findings of the MAHA commission and to promote a more proactive approach, tackling root causes undermining the health and happiness of American children.”
Why It Matters
Vaccines have become an increasingly divisive issue in the U.S. Skepticism of vaccines, such as that they might be the cause of chronic diseases like autism, is being pushed by prominent anti-vaccine advocates like Kennedy Jr, and vaccination rates have been declining nationwide.
As a result, experts are becoming increasingly concerned about a potential surge in diseases that vaccines typically protect children, teens, and adults against, possibly also leading to a rise in fatalities from these illnesses.
Autism, a complex developmental disorder that impacts the brain, has largely been found to have no single cause, although Kennedy Jr. has been a vocal believer that vaccines play a role in its prevalence.
Aside from genetics, scientists believe various factors, including the age of a child’s father, the mother’s weight, and whether she had diabetes or was exposed to certain chemicals, all could influence whether a child may have autism.
MAHA’s ‘Vaccine Safety’ Investigations
The MAHA report compared the number of vaccinations on the American vaccine schedule to other nations, stating that it “exceeds the number of vaccinations on many European schedules.”
Pointing to how countries like Denmark have nearly half as many vaccines on the schedule as the U.S., the report then states that “no trials have compared advisability and safety of the U.S. vaccine schedule as compared to other nations.”
It says that, despite the growth of the childhood vaccine schedule, there has been “limited scientific inquiry into the links between vaccines and chronic disease, the impacts of vaccine injury, and conflicts of interest in the development of the vaccine schedule.”
The report determines that, as a result, in order to understand the safety of vaccines, “more rigorous clinical trial designs” are needed.
“When they say vaccine safety, they don’t mean what most people mean, they mean that they believe vaccines cause chronic disease like autism,” Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center and an attending physician in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, told Newsweek.
He said that the new health administration appears to believe that the reason vaccines haven’t been found as a cause of autism by scientists previously is because “they haven’t looked in the right way.”
“So they are going to no doubt perturb the system to try and twist it in a manner that makes it look like vaccines cause what they believe to be true,” Offit said.
He said that studies Kennedy Jr previously cited as proof of vaccines causing autism had either not been peer reviewed, were “methodologically impossible to discern what they were trying to prove,” or had been proved false with subsequent studies.
“I don’t trust him,” Offit said. “I don’t trust him to give us good information; I don’t trust him to look at surveillance systems and find the cause of the chronic diseases because he is a science denialist and has been for 20 years.”
Kennedy Jr’s push to investigate vaccine injury and re-assess the immunization schedule for children has sparked alarm among some experts about a resurgence of disease.
“Parents will be especially alarmed and this will place terrible burdens on pediatricians who will need to assuage their worries in order to provide important protections against serious and sometimes fatal diseases,” Helen Tager-Flusberg, a professor and director of the Center for Autism Research Excellence at Boston University, told Newsweek.
She added that “we are likely going to see a resurgence of diseases like measles or even polio long after they had been virtually eradicated.”
“The toll on families cannot be calculated,” she said.
Offit said 2025 has brought the biggest measles outbreak in 33 years, an increased number of children dying from whooping cough, and hundreds of children dying from the flu as well.
“It’s already happening,” he said. “I think what’ll happen is it’ll get worse.”
A HHS spokesperson told Newsweek: “The Department is reaffirming the importance of the doctor–patient relationship so people can make informed decisions about their health in partnership with their health care providers, recognizing that each person’s needs are unique.”
“HHS remains committed to supporting the health of the American people while respecting their right to clear, honest information and personal choice.”
Finding The Cause Of Autism
The report also highlighted the growing rates of autism diagnoses in America, as well as other neurodevelopmental disorders like Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).
It said that over 7.5 million K-12 students received special education services between 2023 and 2024.
While the report states “preliminary evidence suggests a possible association between the consumption of food colorings and autism,” it does not make any declarations on the connection between vaccines and autism.
This connection is something that both Trump and Kennedy Jr. have previously entertained, despite research debunking theories that vaccines could cause autism.
Kennedy Jr. is expected to make an additional announcement this month revealing his team’s research and findings on the cause of autism, and experts are already concerned about it.
“We are using gold-standard science to get to the bottom of America’s unprecedented rise in autism rates,” the HHS spokesperson told Newsweek. “Until we release the final report, any claims about its contents are nothing more than speculation.”
“There have been years of research about the neurobiology of autism and some progress made but the issues are very complicated and broach many areas of science and medicine,” Catherine Lord, a professor of psychiatry and education at the University of California, Los Angeles, told Newsweek.
She added that “it also seems very unlikely that autism is caused by one thing,” and that “to propose that this can be solved quickly seems irresponsible.”
Offit also said that research so far has largely pointed to autism being “something you’re born with,” suggesting it is influenced by genetic factors, among other things, not environmental exposures post birth.
He added that “[Kennedy Jr’s] notion that it is preventable, suggesting that it is an environmental factor after the child is born,” goes against what a lot of the latest research currently indicates.
“I am concerned about this report bringing up yet again links between vaccines and autism, a topic that has received more attention from researchers over the last two decades than any other in the field,” Tager-Flusberg said. “We know that vaccines do not cause autism.”
She added that “we desperately need our current administration to focus on the decades of research funded by the NIH and other agencies on what is actually known about autism.”
Lord said that autistic people and the parents of autistic children “already have to deal with a world that is not made for them and have to figure out ways to live and be happy sometimes with little help.”
“I worry that these efforts confuse everyone, both families with autism and the rest of us, about what is important and what is reasonable,” she said.
She said that there are many ways to support autistic children and adults, and that she wished “we could concentrate on them and the fact that we can make lives better now for autistic children and adults if we try, rather than these grand visions that are not based on science or simple reality.”
This article contains reporting from the Associated Press.
Full Interview Below
Newsweek’s interview with Helen Tager-Flusberg, a professor and director of the Center for Autism Research Excellence at Boston University.
Q1: Are you concerned about what this report has said? Why/why not?
“I am concerned about this report bringing up yet again links between vaccines and autism, a topic that has received more attention from researchers over the last two decades than any other in the field. We know that vaccines do not cause autism!”
Q2: What impacts do you think it will have on views on vaccines and autism?
“There will be many people who don’t have the historical context who will likely become alarmed that our government is now raising questions about vaccines. Parents will be especially alarmed and this will place terrible burdens on pediatricians who will need to assuage their worries in order to provide important protections against serious and sometimes fatal diseases.”
Q3: What wider impacts will this have?
“People with certain health conditions who cannot be vaccinated will be placed at higher risk for illnesses as the population vaccination rates decline. We are likely going to see a resurgence of diseases like measles or even polio long after they had been virtually eradicated. The toll on families cannot be calculated.”
“I am very concerned that the Secretary’s forthcoming report on autism expected later this month will not only question the role of vaccines in causing autism but may point to additional factors for which there is no strong scientific evidence. We desperately need our current administration to focus on the decades of research funded by the NIH and other agencies on what is actually known about autism.”
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