Health dept. head claims getting measles is good thing: 'Gives you lifetime of protection'

Health and Human Services Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has stopped short of recommending Americans be vaccinated against measles, is now suggesting everyone should get the virus to build up their immunity.

"It used to be, when I were a kid, that everybody got measles. And the measles gave you lifetime protection against measles infection,” Kennedy told Fox News' Sean Hannity as reported in The Daily Beast. “The vaccine doesn’t do that. The vaccine is effective for some people for life, but for many people it wanes.”

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Kennedy, who downplayed his anti-vaccine stance during his Senate confirmation, also told Hannity, "There are adverse events from the vaccine. It does cause deaths every year. It causes all the illnesses that measles itself cause, like encephalitis and blindness, etc., so people ought to be able to make that choice for themselves.”

Kennedy did admit, however, that the vaccine does “stop the spread of the disease.”

His comments come in the midst of a measles outbreak in Texas that has killed at least two unvaccinated people.

"More than 220 people in the state have been diagnosed with the infectious virus, and California, New York, and Maryland have also reported cases of late," according to the article. "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is sweating over the outbreak, warning health-care workers and travelers to 'be vigilant.'”

Read The Daily Beast article here.