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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman.
We turn now to several confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill for President Trump’s Cabinet members, beginning with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who faced a second day of hearings for health secretary. Kennedy has previously campaigned as pro-choice, but during the hearing he repeatedly said he believes, quote, “every abortion is a tragedy,” and vowed to implement Trump’s policies. He also gave incorrect information about Medicare and Medicaid.
Kennedy’s long record of vaccine skepticism was a major focus. He repeatedly refused to disavow the debunked link between vaccines and autism and refused to acknowledge COVID vaccines are lifesaving. But he ended with this claim:
ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR.: Before I conclude, I want to make sure this committee is clear about a few things. News reports and many in the hearing yesterday have claimed that I’m anti-vaccine and anti-industry. Well, I’m neither. I’m pro-safety. I’m pro-good science. I worked for 40 years to raise awareness about mercury and other toxics in fish, and nobody called me anti-fish. All my kids are vaccinated. I believe vaccines have saved millions of lives and play a critical role in healthcare.
AMY GOODMAN: In the same hearing on Thursday, Kennedy defended his trip to Samoa in June of 2019, four months before a measles outbreak was declared that killed 83 people, mostly children. Kennedy’s anti-vaccine nonprofit Children’s Health Defense offered to finance the trip. This is Democratic Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts questioning Kennedy about that trip.
SEN. ED MARKEY: So, let me just follow through now, 2019. So, now, in October of 2019, the CDC declared a measles outbreak in Samoa. And in November, Samoa started a mass vaccination campaign to stop the outbreak. That same month, November of 2019, after 16 people had already died from the outbreak and Samoa was trying to respond to the crisis, you sent a letter to the prime minister of Samoa stating that, quote, “It is a regrettable possibility that these children are [casualties] of the vaccine.” By unanimous consent, I will introduce that letter into the record.
SEN. BILL CASSIDY: Without objection.
SEN. ED MARKEY: So, as Samoa was trying to contain the outbreak, you were saying that it was the fault of the vaccine, rather than the absence of vaccinations, that caused the outbreak in Samoa in the same year you visited Samoa.
ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR.: And I replied to that, Senator —
SEN. ED MARKEY: Now, the death count — let me — let me just finish. The death count in Samoa grew to 83. And ultimately, volunteers in New Zealand sent tiny coffins to help bury the dozens of children who died. And the Samoan director general of health later said, “With his last name and the status attached to it, people will believe him. People will believe Robert Kennedy.”
AMY GOODMAN: So, that was Senator Markey. This week, Samoa’s prime minister criticized RFK Jr.’s vaccine views and said she’s surprised by his nomination for health secretary.
For more, we’re joined by two guests, but we’re going to begin in Apia, the capital of Samoa. We’ll begin with Aiono Dr. Alec Ekeroma, who is the current director general of health for Samoa’s Health Ministry.
Doctor, welcome to Democracy Now! Thanks for joining us from Samoa. Can you explain? For two days we’ve heard about Samoa. Explain exactly what happened in 2019.
DR. ALEC EKEROMA: Thank you very much for the opportunity.
In 2019, Samoa had a very low vaccination rate, and that was because of some problems back in 2018 with a matching-mixing of vaccines that resulted in two deaths. And so, therefore, we had a low vaccination rate already. And then Kennedy visited, before the measles outbreak. Now, the measles outbreak, of course, it came from New Zealand across the islands, and because of a low vaccination rate, it just took off, and so resulting in so many deaths.
But the government responded quickly and demanded a vaccine campaign — vaccination campaign, and there was some international assistance to Samoa from all countries in the world, who came across — doctors and nurses came across to Samoa to help with the mass vaccination of our people. So, that drove the vaccination up, rate up, to 90%, within a few months.
So, Kennedy’s presence in Samoa a few months before that actually emboldened the anti-vaxxers locally and also from New Zealand. And so, they were the ones, really, that tried to sow the vaccine hesitancy in the country. But, fortunately, our leaders did not believe that and mounted this emergency and mass vaccination campaign.
AMY GOODMAN: Why did Kennedy go to Samoa?
DR. ALEC EKEROMA: Apparently, he came to talk about some database that they could create. But when he was here, he talked to — well, he talked to the director — the then-director general of health and to the prime minister, but he also talked to local anti-vaxxers, as well. So, I’m not privy to what was discussed, but the result of his visit didn’t result in any improvements in our ICT or software capabilities in the country. None was promised.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to bring our other guest into this conversation. As we talk to the health director in Samoa, I also want to bring Brian Deer in, who was there in 2018 — in 2019 in the midst of the measles outbreak. He’s an investigative journalist and author of The Doctor Who Fooled the World. His recent New York Times opinion piece, “I’ll Never Forget What Kennedy Did During Samoa’s Measles Outbreak.” So, can you elaborate further on what Dr. Ekeroma is saying?
BRIAN DEER: Good morning, Amy.
Yes, indeed, I was out in Samoa at the time, and I spent a great deal of my time there speaking to the mothers of children who died from measles. And it was the most emotional experience, and I ended my time there just crying, as I became overcome by the pain of these mothers. Eighty-three people died, overwhelmingly small children.
Now, Mr. Kennedy thinks he knows better than anybody else. He claims that he’s not anti-vaccine. I’ve been following what is now called the anti-vaccine movement for 25 years. And I can assure you that Mr. Kennedy is not only an anti-vaccine campaigner, he is the preeminent anti-vaccine campaigner in the world. And he went to Samoa, and after the outbreak began, he then wrote to the prime minister, trying to suggest that it wasn’t, in fact, the virus at all that was killing these children, but was, in fact, the responsibility of the vaccine itself.
And he didn’t stop there. Even this week, speaking to senators, he claimed that nobody knows what these children died from, even though the measles was — the vaccine there had collapsed as a result of other issues. And then, after a vaccination campaign that followed the outbreak, or took part — occurred at the same time as the outbreak, the children stopped dying. But Mr. Kennedy felt that he should tell senators that nobody knows what killed those children — extraordinary thing for him to say.
AMY GOODMAN: What do you think, Brian Deer — and then I want to ask the health minister in Samoa — of him being the health secretary, the secretary of health and human services of the United States?
BRIAN DEER: Well, I have to say, listening to him over the last couple of days, Amy, that I was shocked by the attitude he displayed. He was making it absolutely clear that notwithstanding him being the — hoping to become the head of an agency with a $2,000 billion budget and employing 90,000 people, he was going to personally involve himself in vaccine science, and it would be he who would be deciding whether the research was conducted properly, even though he has no medical or scientific qualifications at all, and not the enormous staff he represents and the agencies, that have actually written to him previously telling him that the research overwhelmingly and conclusively shows that there is no link between vaccines and, for example, autism. He was making it absolutely clear to senators that he was going to — in that job, with those enormous responsibilities, for that massive entity, he was going to involve himself in the individual pieces of research and deciding for himself whether vaccines, for example, cause autism.
AMY GOODMAN: And before we leave Samoa, Dr. Alec Ekeroma, if you can talk about the significance of if he is confirmed as health secretary here in the U.S.?
DR. ALEC EKEROMA: It is quite significant. Someone who is prominent in the world, with a [inaudible], spitting out anti-vaccine sentiments, emboldening anti-vaxxers around the world and in Samoa, is going to be a public health disaster for us. Already, we’re going to have reduction in U.S. funding to United Nations and to WHO that is going to affect our capability here. And then you add in Bob Kennedy into this role, that is going to slow down the flow of vaccines to us, that is going to harm our public health state in this country. And so, therefore, it will be a disaster for us.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you, Dr. Alec Ekeroma, for joining us, director general of health for Samoa’s Health Ministry.
