Theory of Unknown Origin: Vaccines and autism

By Soncirey Mitchell
Reader Staff

U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy Jr. recently visited Idaho to promote his “Make America Healthy Again” movement. Gov. Brad Little welcomed him, declaring August “Keep Idaho Healthy Month.” Meanwhile, the Idaho Capital Sun reported that demonstrators gathered outside the Capitol in Boise during the visit, chanting, “Hey, hey, RFK. How many kids did you kill today?”

The backlash is in response to Kennedy’s fearmongering and support of the debunked claim that vaccines are unsafe and cause autism, which has led to a resurgence of once-eradicated diseases like measles.

Kennedy’s hyperfixation on the conspiracy has led to his current crusade to “cure” autism, which has enraged, alienated and scared diagnosed individuals, activists and medical professionals.

“These are kids who will never pay taxes. They’ll never hold a job. They’ll never play baseball. They’ll never write a poem. They’ll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted,” said Kennedy at an April press conference.

As many have pointed out, these descriptors do not apply to the vast majority of autistic people. Still, the fear of severe cognitive disabilities has led many parents to risk potentially deadly diseases. This previously niche conspiracy theory has no clear origin; however, its popularity can be traced to disgraced former-Dr. Andrew Wakefield.

Falsified evidence

Wakefield published a 1998 article in which he claimed to have connected the measles, mumps and rubella childhood vaccine and what he called “autistic enterocolitis.” He argued that the MMR vaccine had caused “chronic intestinal measles,” leading to digestive problems that damaged children’s brains. His proposed solution was to vaccinate for each disease separately, which would require entirely new vaccinations, like the one he patented for measles the year before.

Given the seriousness of the allegations, the British General Medical Council and other researchers and reporters began an investigation into the research that spanned years. Ultimately, the GMC concluded that Wakefield had been “dishonest, violated basic research ethics rules and showed a ‘callous disregard’ for the suffering of children involved in his research,” according to The New York Times.

Wakefield first claimed a link between the MMR vaccine and Crohn’s disease, which was quickly disproven, according to The Times. He then published his now redacted paper connecting it to autism in The Lancet in 1998.

Wakefield’s study was based on only 12 children, whom he subjected to invasive, painful and unnecessary tests such as lumbar punctures, “for which he did not receive ethical approval,” according to The Times. As part of his research, Wakefield admitted to taking blood samples from children at his son’s birthday party, paying each kid $5.

British journalists also reported that Wakefield’s research was in large part funded by lawyers representing parents of autistic children who were attempting to sue vaccine makers.

The GMC could not recreate Wakefield’s findings, and he refused to validate them with controlled experiments. Ultimately, the GMC found Wakefield guilty of more than 30 charges.

Yet his claims spread far beyond the MMR vaccine, causing many to speculate that thimerosal — a mercury-based preservative used to stop bacterial growth in some vaccines — caused autism. The MMR vaccine Wakefield studied never actually included thimerosal as an ingredient.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention investigated the claims, finding that thimerosal caused “minor reactions like redness and swelling at the injection site” for some individuals, but was otherwise harmless. Still, the Food and Drug Administration removed thimerosal from childhood vaccines. Multi-dose flu shots still contain thimerosal, but single-dose shots without it are available for children.

Independent studies

In 2002, researchers from the Danish Epidemiology Science Center and the U.S. National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities worked to determine whether the MMR vaccine could be linked to autism. They studied every child born in Denmark from January 1991 through December 1998, comparing their MMR-vaccination status — obtained through the Danish National Board of Health — to the Danish Psychiatric Center Register.

According to their findings, of the 537,303 children in the study, 440,655 had been vaccinated with the MMR vaccine. Of the 537,303 individuals, 316 were diagnosed with autistic disorder and 422 with autistic-spectrum disorders. They then compared the number of vaccinated autistic children to unvaccinated autistic children and determined that there was no correlation between vaccinations and autism. In fact, with an odds ratio of 0.92 — with 1.00 meaning “no association” — there was actually a negative association. They further divided the children by age at the time of vaccination, the time since the vaccination and the date of the diagnosis, and confirmed once more that there was no association between the MMR vaccine and autism.

Eleven years later, researchers at the Whiteley-Martin Research Centre in Australia published another paper, which analyzed all available studies, including data from 1,266,327 children. The findings reaffirmed the Danish ruling on MMR and further proved that there was no relationship between vaccines, thimerosal or mercury and autism.

Fact vs fiction

The number of people diagnosed with autism or autism spectrum disorder continues to grow, which anti-vaxxers claim is because more and more people are becoming autistic due to vaccines or other environmental factors. According to a PBS interview with Professor John J. Pitney, author of the book The Politics of Autism: Navigating the Contested Spectrum, “It is very likely that many people with profound autism were misdiagnosed with ‘mental retardation,’ a term in use [during the ’50s and ’60s], or schizophrenia, while other autistic people probably got no diagnosis at all.”

This misunderstanding is coupled with the belief that children aren’t born with autism but rather contract it from exposure to vaccines. Doctors can’t reliably diagnose autism until children reach their second or third birthday — or later, in mild cases — and begin to fully utilize communication and social skills, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Research is ongoing, but autism has been tied to different genetic conditions and mutations that either cause or raise the likelihood of being born with autism or ASD. As of 2022, one in 31 8-year-old U.S. children are diagnosed with ASD, according to the CDC.

The anti-vax industry

Besides supposedly “explaining” autism, this conspiracy theory appeals to many because it argues that pharmaceutical companies know the risks and choose to sell faulty products anyway. This isn’t much of a leap for many people, considering U.S. pharmaceutical companies are known to charge exorbitant prices for life-saving medications like insulin.

Despite studies from around the globe proving the safety and necessity of vaccines, anti-vaxxers are more inclined to believe individuals who claim to go against the norms of the money-making industry. As the Associated Press reported, most believers don’t realize that the anti-vax community leaders are also getting rich.

Famous anti-vaxxers Ty and Charleen Bollinger have made millions selling DVDs and books. Their series The Truth About Vaccines capitalized on the fear and anger of the COVID-19 pandemic, during which time the Bollingers aligned themselves with the far-right and even participated in the Jan. 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol insurrection, the AP reported.

The Bollingers have also doled out hundreds of thousands of dollars in commissions to individuals who advertise their products on social media using affiliate links. Prior to the 2021 AP investigation, the Bollingers’ website listed Children’s Health Defense — Kennedy’s anti-vax nonprofit — as an affiliate and Kennedy as among the Top 10 on the “Overall Sales Leaderboard.” 

People like Kennedy and the Bollingers have learned how to weaponize fear for wealth and power, manipulating people who just want to keep their kids safe. In 1990, there were 20,808 confirmed cases of measles in the U.S., according to the CDC. By 2000, that number dropped to 85 and continued to decrease. As of July 23, there have been 1,319 confirmed cases of the deadly disease in 2025 alone. Sixty-six percent of cases are in youth ages 19 and younger, and three people have died. Regardless of what you believe about the anti-vax movement, it’s clear that it is endangering all children.