There is currently a deadly belief that is beginning to trend in the United States regarding the supposed link between vaccines and autism. The more our Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., talks about the topic, the more he seems to be one of the leading reasons for the public’s negative narrative.

Ever since Kennedy entered office, there has been a resurgence in life-ending diseases that were once eradicated in the United States. Deadly diseases such as measles have seemed to make a comeback, largely due to Kennedy’s spread of misinformation about the “link” between vaccines and autism. His misinformation has not only spread throughout the United States, but it has even made its way throughout the world to Oceania, resulting in the deaths of nearly 100 young Samoans. Slowly, the United States is going down the same path.

Nationwide, some autistic individuals and their families have remarked on their disdain for Kennedy’s insensitive claims about how autistic individuals will “never pay taxes,” “write a poem,” or “go on a date” as well as his citation of a research paper that claimed to have a link between vaccines and autism, which was funded by an anti-vaccination group.

“My son has been offended by some of his comments,” English teacher Andrea Meagher said. “When I first heard him say that, I was extremely angry. I was mad at him because he was spreading misinformation. But then it made me sad because there are people who believe that.”

Although some would agree that fearing what could happen to your children is a natural instinct, we can not allow Kennedy to continue to feed the trend of being anti-vaccine. We should continue to strive to protect our children from disease, as well as protect ourselves from the rapid spread of deadly misinformation that is becoming a regular occurrence in our country.

“Autism is not a death sentence,” Meagher said. “Not vaccinating for something that is a really severe disease can be a death sentence.”