U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told President Donald Trump that his agency will have information about what’s causing autism within weeks.
“We’re finding interventions, certain interventions now that are clearly almost certainly causing autism and we’re gonna be able to address those in September,” Kennedy said during a cabinet meeting Tuesday.
In April, the health secretary committed to “know what has caused the autism epidemic” by September. He later softened his stance, saying instead that “we expect to begin to have answers” by that point and that his agency would be initiating studies to identify environmental toxins responsible for autism.
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During the Tuesday meeting, Trump called autism “such a tremendous horror show” and asked Kennedy about how autism rates have grown in recent decades.
“There’s something wrong when you see the kind of numbers that you have today versus 20 years ago,” Trump said. “So there has to be something artificially causing this, meaning a drug or something, and I know you’re looking very strongly at different things and I hope you can come out with that as soon as possible.”
“We will,” Kennedy responded.
Trump insisted that it will be a “big day” when the forthcoming announcements are made.
“I think we maybe know the reason, and I look forward to that press conference to be with you in that press conference. That’s going to be a great thing,” Trump told Kennedy.
Autism experts attribute the rise in prevalence to better awareness, improved screening tools and methods and changes in the diagnostic criteria.
The expedited federal effort to uncover what’s behind the increase in autism has been met with skepticism by many long-time researchers and advocates, particularly given that Kennedy spent years promoting a link between autism and vaccines despite numerous studies discrediting that theory.
Dr. Helen Tager-Flusberg, director of the Center for Autism Research Excellence at Boston University, who’s leading the Coalition of Autism Scientists, a group of more than 300 researchers in the field, said she suspects that Kennedy’s announcements will have something to do with vaccines or fluoride, both of which have previously been targeted by David Geier, a vaccine critic who Kennedy hired at HHS.
“Of great concern is the fact that this is not the way one reports potentially explosive findings to the public as the president and secretary did today and are planning to next month,” Tager-Flusberg said.
Rather, she said that researchers go through a peer-review process and publish their findings in a reputable journal with documentation so that their study can be replicated.
“Press conferences presented by a non-scientist — Kennedy — and attended by the president are a way to sensationalize the findings and raise alarm in the public,” Tager-Flusberg said. “This is not science.”
