Michael Shearer

public health approaches vaccination.

Yeah, he is convinced he became convinced in the mid 2000s.

that there was an unrecognized epidemic of disease, things like autism or arthritis, that were arising from vaccines, including mostly vaccines given to children either in the first year of life or shortly afterwards.

And he was making those arguments and still making those arguments based on mostly an absence of evidence.

There is not a lot of clear scientific evidence available

that there is a direct connection between these two things.

His point, when you get down to it, and this is actually the debate that's being made right now as we speak in the CDC, is that that science needs to be done.

And so he is committed to spend billions of dollars

on hundreds of studies to investigate a connection between things like autism and first-year vaccines that most scientific leaders do not believe exists.

And even if it was found, would have such a small impact that it would probably not change vaccine recommendations because vaccines are a big part of the reason why we no longer fear infectious disease anymore.

I mean, the reason we're able to die of...

cancer and heart disease late in life is because we didn't die of measles or hepatitis earlier in life.

Then in the interim, while he's doing those studies, he has sought to change research priorities around vaccination and also change recommendations around vaccination in a way that vaccinologists fear will lead to a spike in infectious disease over the coming years that is going to hurt people.

And so you have this like remarkable fight going on now within public health over, you know, who's going to hurt more kids.

I mean, like you couldn't make the stakes any higher than this, right?

It's like both sides are saying to the other side, if you do this, kids will die.

You know, this is just one of the hottest areas of politics right now.

Yeah, I mean, Offit is furious and outspoken.

Offit's view was that Kennedy just doesn't have the data to support what he's saying.

And if he had the data, he should publish it, but he can't publish it.