Washington D.C. – Trump CDC Director Erica Schwartz reportedly “ordered” CDC officials to challenge two measles deaths reported by Pennsylvania health officials last week. It was a “highly unusual decision depart[ing] from the agency’s practice of including such data from state health departments, which historically make the determinations.”
After days of delay, on Sunday “an asterisked explanation” was posted on the CDC website instead of the 2 reported deaths that the Pennsylvania Department of Health insist were “meticulously investigated” and confirmed “meets the [CDC] case definition for a measles case.”
Just weeks after pledging to speak “truth to power”, Dr. Schwartz took the unprecedented step to skirt CDC reporting protocols after her new boss and “most famous vaccine skeptic on the planet”, health secretary RFK Jr., baselessly suggested the measles deaths were “fabricated” to deflect from his own culpability in the tragedy.
Brad Woodhouse, President of Protect Our Care: “As we feared but expected, Director Schwartz almost immediately bent the knee to the Trump-RFK Jr. anti-vax agenda despite her vows of independence. Here we are in the middle of a record-breaking and now deadly year for measles. In Pennsylvania alone, nearly 500 have been stricken with measles, nearly 90 put in the hospital, and two are now dead. As we speak, new outbreaks are spreading fast in Kentucky, Wisconsin, and Georgia. This is a 5-alarm fire, but Trump’s CDC director is content to join RFK Jr. in a cynical semantic debate about what the definition of ‘fire’ is. It’s a disgrace. This is the time for a full court press from the CDC to encourage everyone to get vaccinated against measles, especially with kids back in school. This is not the time to play political games to help deflect responsibility from Donald Trump and RFK Jr. who have spread lies about the safety of the MMR vaccine further than ever before. Yet we’re being treated to more conspiracy theories on top of anti-vax conspiracy theories and outright disinformation – all of which contributes to a further drop in vaccination rates and even more outbreaks of preventable disease.”
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