WSJ asks Kennedy to cast aside ‘antivax hooey' amid Texas measles outbreak
'We are on record as skeptical of RFK Jr.'s nomination. The Senate confirmed him. Now the best-case scenario would be for Mr. Kennedy to internalize that he is no longer an activist outsider who needs to take provocative potshots to get attention,' the Journal's editorial board wrote.
As of last week, 48 children in the South Plains region of Texas have confirmed cases of measles, and 13 have been hospitalized. The disease is so transmissible that up to 9 out of 10 people who come into contact someone with measles can be infected, according to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.
According to the Texas Department of State Health Services, all the children who have been infected are either unvaccinated or have unconfirmed vaccination statuses. The department has stated 'additional cases are likely' due to how contagious measles is.
'The tragedy is that this doesn't have to keep happening. In 2000 measles was declared eliminated from the U.S., meaning 12 months with no continuous spread,' the Journal's op-ed read.
'Yet for some people, the reality of measles feels like a sepia-toned history lesson, whereas the antivax hooey featured on podcasts these days sounds current,' the Journal added. 'RFK Jr., an environmental lawyer by trade, has long been part of the problem, and at his Senate confirmation hearings he presented himself as just asking questions, man. That undersells his role in spreading doubt and confusion.'
The op-ed additionally noted the falling vaccination rates among kindergarteners in recent years. All states and D.C. require vaccinations for school attendance, but exceptions are often permitted. During the 2023-2024 school year, vaccination coverage among U.S. kindergarteners fell to 92.7 percent when it came to the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine.
Federal health authorities have long maintained a 'Healthy People 2030' target of achieving 95 percent MMR immunization coverage. This level of coverage is considered ideal for maintaining herd immunity in a population.
Whether this aim for vaccine coverage will continue now remains unclear as Kennedy, a longtime vaccine skeptic, has signaled he will prioritize work on chronic illnesses as opposed to infectious disease.
The Hill has reached out to the HHS for comment on the Journal's op-ed.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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USA Today
14 minutes ago
- USA Today
RFK Jr. hiked 'extremely difficult' Phoenix trail in July heat
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Los Angeles Times
3 hours ago
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CNN
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At least 28 cases involved patients who may not have been deceased at the time the organ procurement process began, raising 'serious ethical and legal questions.' 'Our findings show that hospitals allowed the organ procurement process to begin when patients showed signs of life, and this is horrifying,' HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in the release. 'The organ procurement organizations that coordinate access to transplants will be held accountable. The entire system must be fixed to ensure that every potential donor's life is treated with the sanctity it deserves.' Network for Hope has not responded to CNN's request for comment, but it says on its website that it is 'fully committed to transparency' and is in full compliance with all requirements of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which regulates organ donation organizations. 'Our goal has always been and will remain to meet the highest ethical and medical standards in donation and transplantation.' 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The agency is mandating system-level changes to safeguard potential organ donors across the US and said the Kentucky-area organization needed to conduct a 'full root cause analysis of its failures to follow internal protocols.' It also said the organization must adopt a formal procedure to halt a donation process if there are safety concerns. Network for Hope says on its website: 'We are equally committed to addressing the recent guidance from the HRSA and we are already evaluating whether any updates to our current practices are needed.' The federal investigation was launched after one case in Kentucky came to light during a congressional hearing in September. In 2021, 33-year-old TJ Hoover was hospitalized after a drug overdose. He woke up in the operating room to find people shaving his chest, bathing his body in surgical solution and talking about harvesting his organs. Earlier that day, a doctor had declared him brain-dead, according to his medical records, even though he seemed to be reacting to stimuli, making eye contact and shaking his head. Former staffers of the organ procurement organization who were involved in Hoover's case raised concerns that he wasn't brain-dead and should not have been on the operating table. The concerns were ignored, according to the federal investigation. Staff told CNN that the procedure to take Hoover's organs stopped after a surgeon saw his reaction to stimuli. The Kentucky procurement organization told CNN last fall that it had reviewed the case and 'remains confident that accepted practices and approved protocols were followed.' Hoover now lives with his sister in Richmond, Kentucky, and is undergoing extensive physical therapy and treatment, much of which is shared on TikTok in an effort to inspire others. Congress has been investigating the nation's organ donation system for years. Tuesday's hearing is intended to determine what lessons could be learned from the investigation, what changes are necessary to make the system better and what challenges lie ahead. One issue involves organs procured from patients who aren't brain-dead. Although most donations in the US come from people who are brain-dead, there are other circumstances in which a patient may become an organ donor. It's called donation after circulatory death, or DCD, and it has become much more common in recent years, although some experts question the ethics of the practice. A donation after brain death is defined by the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network as 'the organ recovery process that may occur following death by irreversible cessation of cerebral and brain stem function; characterized by absence of electrical activity in the brain, blood flow to the brain, and brain function as determined by clinical assessment of responses.' DCD, by comparison, is when 'you've got somebody with essentially devastating illness or injury, and their family's decided to withdraw life support,' Dr. Robert Cannon, an associate professor of surgery and surgical director of the liver transplant program at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, told CNN last year after Hoover's case came to light. Cannon was not involved in Hoover's case but was familiar with it because he testified about lapses in the organ procurement system at the House Energy and Commerce Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing where the case came to light in September. 'Certainly, we have potential DCD donors with lots of reflexes,' Cannon said. 'But as long as the family knows this is what's happening with their loved one, this process is considered ethical and standard.'
