Vaccine Misinformation Distorts Science – a Biochemist Explains How RFK Jr. and His Lawyer’s Claims Threaten Public Health

Vaccines Undergo the Same Approval Process as Other Drugs
Clinical trials for vaccines and other drugs are blinded, randomized and placebo-controlled studies. For a vaccine trial, this means that participants are randomly divided into one group that receives the vaccine and a second group that receives a placebo saline solution. The researchers carrying out the study, and sometimes the participants themselves, do not know who has received the vaccine or the placebo until the study has finished. This eliminates bias.

Results are published in the public domain. For example, vaccine trial data for COVID-19, human papilloma virus, rotavirus and hepatitis B are available for anyone to access.

Aluminum Adjuvants Help Boost Immunity
Kennedy is co-counsel with a law firm that is suing the pharmaceutical company Merck based in part on the unfounded assertion that the aluminum in one of its vaccines causes neurological disease. Aluminum is added to many vaccines as an adjuvant to strengthen the body’s immune response to the vaccine, thereby enhancing the body’s defense against the targeted microbe.

The law firm’s claim is based on a 2020 report showing that brain tissue from some patients with Alzheimer’s disease, autism and multiple sclerosis have elevated levels of aluminum. The authors of that study do not assert that vaccines are the source of the aluminum, and vaccines are unlikely to be the culprit.

Notably, the brain samples analyzed in that study were from 47- to 105-year-old patients. Most people are exposed to aluminum primarily through their diets, and aluminum is eliminated from the body within days. Therefore, aluminum exposure from childhood vaccines is not expected to persist in those patients.

Ironically, Kennedy’s lawyer, Siri, wants the FDA to withdraw some vaccines for containing less aluminum than stated by the manufacturer.

Vaccine Manufacturers Are Liable for Injury or Death
Kennedy’s lawsuit against Merck contradicts his insistence that vaccine manufacturers are fully immune from litigation.

His claim is based on an incorrect interpretation of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, or VICP. The VICP is a no-fault federal program created to reduce frivolous lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers, which threaten to cause vaccine shortages and a resurgence of vaccine-preventable disease.

A person claiming injury from a vaccine can petition the U.S. Court of Federal Claims through the VICP for monetary compensation. If the VICP petition is denied, the claimant can then sue the vaccine manufacturer.

The majority of cases resolved under the VICP end in a negotiated settlement between parties without establishing that a vaccine was the cause of the claimed injury. Kennedy and his law firm have incorrectly used the payouts under the VICP to assert that vaccines are unsafe.

The VICP gets the vaccine manufacturer off the hook only if it has complied with all requirements of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act and exercised due care. It does not protect the vaccine maker from claims of fraud or withholding information regarding the safety or efficacy of the vaccine during its development or after approval.

Good Nutrition and Sanitation Are Not Substitutes for Vaccination
Kennedy asserts that populations with adequate nutrition do not need vaccines to avoid infectious diseases. While it is clear that improvements in nutrition, sanitation, water treatment, food safety and public health measures have played important roles in reducing deaths and severe complications from infectious diseases, these factors do not eliminate the need for vaccines.

After World War II, the U.S. was a wealthy nation with substantial health-related infrastructure. Yet, Americans reported an average of 1 million cases per year of now-preventable infectious diseases.

Vaccines introduced or expanded in the 1950s and 1960s against diseases like diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, measles, polio, mumps, rubella and Haemophilus influenza B have resulted in the near or complete eradication of those diseases.

It’s easy to forget why many infectious diseases are rarely encountered today: The success of vaccines does not always tell its own story. RFK Jr.’s potential ascent to the role of secretary of Health and Human Services will offer up ample opportunities to retell this story and counter misinformation.

Mark R. O’Brian is Professor and Chair of Biochemistry, University at Buffalo. This article is published courtesy of The Conversation. This is an updated version of an article originally published on July 26, 2024.