WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Samoa’s prime well being official on Monday denounced as “a whole lie” remarks that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made throughout his bid to change into U.S. well being secretary, rejecting his declare that some who died within the nation’s 2019 measles epidemic didn’t have the illness.
“We don’t know what was killing them,” Kennedy mentioned throughout tense U.S. Senate hearings final week on whether or not he ought to oversee the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Providers, suggesting that the reason for the 83 deaths — principally of youngsters beneath age 5 — was unclear.
“It’s a complete fabrication,” Samoa Director-Normal of Well being Dr. Alec Ekeroma advised The Related Press of Kennedy’s feedback.
U.S. senators grilled Kennedy last week over his 2019 Samoa journey, accusing him of downplaying his position within the epidemic.
The outbreak devastated the Pacific island nation in 2019, killing 83 individuals in a inhabitants of 200,000. Vaccination charges have been traditionally low due to poor public well being administration and the 2018 deaths of two infants whose vaccines have been incorrectly ready, prompting fears that the MMR immunization was unsafe earlier than the character of the error was found.
The federal government suspended vaccinations for 10 months earlier than the outbreak — the interval when Kennedy visited. His journey was organized by a Samoan anti-vaccine influencer, in response to a 2021 weblog put up by Kennedy.
On Wednesday, Kennedy denied that his go to had fueled anti-vaccine sentiment. A spokesperson didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Monday.
“Anti-vaxxers from New Zealand got here to be with him right here,” Ekeroma mentioned. “That’s how I do know that his affect may be far-reaching.”
What did Kennedy say in regards to the deaths?
“When the tissue samples have been despatched to New Zealand, most of these individuals didn’t have measles,” Kennedy advised U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat.
Ekeroma, a medical physician who additionally holds a doctorate in well being, mentioned that the declare was a “big denial” of the truth that medical doctors from a number of international locations traveled to Samoa to deal with measles sufferers.
The Samoan official wasn’t the well being chief in the course of the outbreak, however confirmed key particulars along with his predecessor, he mentioned. Just one post-mortem was carried out and no autopsy tissue samples have been despatched overseas, which was commonplace as a result of measles is a straightforward illness to diagnose, mentioned Ekeroma.
Blood samples from residing sufferers have been despatched to Australia and New Zealand, the place the general public well being company mentioned Monday that testing had confirmed the identical pressure of measles circulating in New Zealand on the time.
Why did Kennedy journey to Samoa?
“I went there – nothing to do with vaccines,” Kennedy mentioned Wednesday. “I went there to introduce a medical informatics system that might digitalize data in Samoa and make well being supply rather more environment friendly.”
Ekeroma rejected that assertion, referring to social media posts by anti-vaccine advocates who posed for photographs with Kennedy throughout his journey. One later wrote on the weblog of Kennedy’s then nonprofit, Kids’s Well being Protection — which has decried MMR vaccines as unsafe — that in the course of the outbreak he acquired recommendation from individuals assembled by Kennedy encouraging the choice remedies he was supplying to Samoan households.
In the identical weblog put up, Kennedy recalled assembly Samoa’s then prime minister, who he mentioned was “curious to measure well being outcomes following the ‘pure experiment’ created by the nationwide respite from vaccines.”
In late 2019, Kennedy wrote to the chief, saying that the deaths may have been brought on by a measles vaccine — statements he repeated in written responses to senators’ questions following the listening to. He urged the Samoan chief to strategy a selected laboratory to analyze the supply of the outbreak.
Did Kennedy’s go to have any sway?
“My phrases had nothing to do with vaccine uptake in Samoa or with the 2019 epidemic,” Kennedy mentioned in his written responses.
However Kennedy emboldened anti-vaccine contacts in Samoa, Ekeroma mentioned, and the epidemic was fueled by disinformation in social media posts within the island nation and overseas.
Moelagi Leilani Jackson, a Samoan nurse who labored on the vaccination marketing campaign, told the AP in 2023 that anti-vaccine campaigners “received louder” after Kennedy’s go to.
“I really feel like they felt they’d the help of Kennedy,” she mentioned.
Nonetheless, Ekeroma mentioned that Kennedy’s overtures weren’t heeded by the nation’s leaders. A vaccination marketing campaign resumed in 2019 and measles vaccines are actually obligatory for Samoan kids.
Would Kennedy’s appointment affect the Pacific?
If Kennedy is affirmed as the highest U.S. well being official this week, it will be “a hazard to us, a hazard to everybody,” Ekeroma mentioned. Kennedy would management U.S. funding for vaccination initiatives and will make inexpensive vaccines tougher for small nations like Samoa to entry, the official mentioned.
“If he’s going to be appointed, then we should truly talk about across the Pacific as to how we’re going to attempt to neutralize his affect within the area,” he added.
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Amanda Seitz contributed to this report from Washington.
