By Yasmeen Abutaleb and Dan Levine<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON, Sept 3 (Reuters) \u2013 U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asked his new CDC director to remove a reference to two Pennsylvania deaths from the agency\u2019s online measles tally after he questioned whether the disease contributed to the fatalities, three sources familiar with the situation said.<\/p>\n
Kennedy\u2019s request came after CDC staffers had already accepted the state\u2019s characterization of the deaths as linked to measles, a Pennsylvania official said.<\/p>\n
Despite that, Erica \u200bSchwartz, the recently appointed director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, agreed with Kennedy\u2019s directive and implemented it without objection, said the \u200cthree sources familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n
The move followed a heated exchange on social media between Kennedy, a long-time anti-vaccine activist appointed by President Donald Trump, and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, a Democrat. The two officials accused each other of politicizing the outbreak in Pennsylvania, the latest state to grapple with a resurgence of measles since the Trump administration took office.<\/p>\n
Data from the CDC and from individual states shows that vaccine rates have been declining, with many medical organizations citing rising\u00a0vaccine hesitancy as a major cause.\u00a0In Pennsylvania alone, the state health department has reported 540 measles cases this year.<\/p>\n
Georges Benjamin, chief \u200cexecutive of \u200bthe American Public Health Association and formerly Maryland\u2019s secretary of health, said it is \u201cunheard of\u201d for the CDC to \u2060publicly raise doubts about the conclusions of state and \u2060local health departments, even if the agency seeks more information.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe secretary had no business interfering in the normal process,\u201d Benjamin said. \u201cHe has an anti-vaccine agenda and he\u2019s using this to play out his anti-vaccine agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grace Davis Jamison, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services which oversees CDC, said the public health agency \u201crequested details necessary to determine whether measles caused or contributed to the deaths.\u201d She cited conflicting reports between county and state health officials over what had transpired. Jamison did \u200bnot comment on Kennedy\u2019s or Schwartz\u2019s role in excluding the deaths. Schwartz did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n
Kennedy has for years promoted the idea that vaccines are more dangerous than the diseases they prevent, despite decades of scientific evidence that they save lives. The combined measles, mumps and rubella shot routinely given to U.S. children has been \u2060shown to provide 97% protection against infection.<\/p>\n
As health secretary, Kennedy has sought to minimize the impact of \u2060rising\u00a0U.S. measles cases, now at their highest level in more than three decades. He has repeatedly cast doubt on whether the virus was \u200bdirectly related to the several deaths reported so far.<\/p>\n
KENNEDY, SHAPIRO TRADE BLAME<\/p>\n
The Pennsylvania health department notified the CDC of two measles-associated deaths on the morning of August 25 and then \u200bmade the news public on its website, according to the Pennsylvania official, who is close to Shapiro.<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania did not share information about the \u200ccircumstances of the deaths other than that the two individuals were unvaccinated. The CDC did not express concern over the information it had received and \u201csignified its ongoing support for the (state health) department\u2019s efforts,\u201d the official said.<\/p>\n
Kennedy called Shapiro by phone and offered federal support to assist with the state\u2019s measles outbreak, the governor said at a press conference later that day. Shapiro said he thanked Kennedy and said the state had implemented an aggressive response, including existing support from CDC and HHS staff, but that he would let the secretary know if they \u2060needed more help.<\/p>\n
Shapiro also said he told Kennedy that the health secretary\u2019s past statements encouraged conspiracy theories and misinformation about the safety of vaccines, \u201chaving a negative impact on communities across America.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kennedy fired back on X the following day, August 26, accusing Shapiro of refusing to share information with the CDC and questioning whether the deaths were \u201caltogether fabricated by one of \u2060the Governor\u2019s hopeful staffers.\u201d<\/p>\n
That same day, the Pennsylvania health department \u200cdiscussed some details of the two cases with the CDC, the official close to Shapiro said. The CDC asked for health \u2060records that contained personally identifiable information about the deceased, which the state is legally barred from sharing, the Pennsylvania official said. \u200bThe state offered \u200cto provide more de-identified information to CDC, but the federal agency has not signed off on the required paperwork, the \u200bofficial added.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for \u2060the Pennsylvania health department said the state has \u201cprovided all required epidemiological data to the CDC.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Friday, the CDC delayed its regular weekly update to its measles data website. When it updated the page on Sunday, it did not include the Pennsylvania fatalities but added an asterisk to its table on deaths with the following note: \u201cAt this time, available information does not establish whether measles caused or contributed to the (Pennsylvania) deaths or whether the individuals died from other causes while infected with measles.\u201d<\/p>\n
The CDC has not indicated what information it will use to determine whether the Pennsylvania deaths were caused by measles, since it is not working with the state health department in its investigation.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Yasmeen Abutaleb in Washington, D.C. and Dan Levine in San \u200bFrancisco; Editing by Michele Gershberg and Aurora Ellis)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Yasmeen Abutaleb and Dan Levine WASHINGTON, Sept 3 (Reuters) \u2013 U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":278107,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-278106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278106\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}