Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. Today we examine how Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vaccine skepticism reshaped the autism debate. When he allied with Donald Trump, he thrust the debunked link between vaccines and autism into the heart of the MAGA agenda. Despite decades of research disproving any connection, nearly one in four Americans still believe vaccines may cause autism.

Now Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kennedy shocked doctors and families by promising his agency will “uncover the cause of autism…once and for all,” even as deep cuts slash medical research budgets. In conversation with our editor in chief, David Remnick, Dr. Alycia Halladay of the Autism Science Foundation explains why focusing on environmental factors—like vaccines or mold—can distract from what science tells us. Misinformation grips parents desperate to help. “You will do anything to help your child…if it means a bleach enema…and you think that’s going to help them, you’ll do it…It’s because they’re desperate.”

That’s our preview of this week’s New Yorker Radio Hour.
Link to Article