Vanity Fair

Over the ensuing months, Samoa was hit by the largest measles outbreak in its history, infecting 5,707 citizens and killing 83 people, most of them children. The outbreak was so lethal, the prime minister declared a state of emergency and ordered mandatory vaccinations, eventually curtailing the spread. Later one of Kennedy’s biggest critics, a pediatrician and member of the FDA’s advisory committee on vaccines, Paul Offit, told PBS that “Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had everything to do with that. And that shows you how disinformation can kill.”

Notes

Paul Offit is mistaken. Offit’s full claim, as told to PBS, is addressed here (also see Other Stories below).

For more information and context

• Did RFK Jr cause a measles outbreak in Samoa?