It looks like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (RFK) will soon be the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS). If he is confirmed by the Senate, RFK will be in charge of virtually all of the nation’s health agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, Medicare, Medicaid, and dozens and dozens of other federal agencies. Robert F Kennedy is currently the head of Children’s Health Defense, the biggest and most influential promoter of distrust of vaccines in the U.S. and around the world. I think we should all be very worried about what Kennedy might do as Secretary of HHS. For example, Kennedy still claims that vaccinations cause autism in children, even though this theory was debunked a long time ago. RFK has pushed other public health conspiracy theories. In his speeches, RFK has compared the vaccination of children to the Holocaust. He claims that Covid-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people. What sort of vaccination policies will RFK be promoting once he is in charge of all the federal agencies that regulate vaccinations?

THE FOUNDING FATHERS AND VACCINES MANDATES.

What did the Founding Fathers think of vaccine mandates? I think every anti-vaxxer and vaccine skeptic assumes that the Founding Fathers would have strongly opposed vaccine mandates as an invasion of their personal liberty, which is what they were fighting for. While that sounds logical, they are wrong.

During the Revolutionary War, a national smallpox epidemic threatened the success of the war itself. The epidemic began early in the war. Many soldiers’ scheduled enlistments ended on January 1, 1776 and a majority of them warned their superiors they planned to not reenlist, mainly due to fear of smallpox. These soldiers said they would rather desert the cause than risk death by smallpox. These soon-to-be expired enlistments forced Generals Benedict Arnold and General Richard Montgomery to launch their assault on Quebec before the year’s end. In November 1775, in one of the first major military operations of the Continental Army, American soldiers marched from Cambridge, Massachusetts towards Quebec to prevent the city from falling to the British. However, in early December, smallpox was reported among the soldiers and was spreading rapidly. When the American army finally reached Quebec, Montgomery reported that only about 800 men were able to fight, as the rest were sick with smallpox. The lack of healthy soldiers resulted in the failed attack on Quebec on December 30. British forces killed Montgomery, wounded Arnold, and captured hundreds of colonists. Arnold maintained substantial forces around Quebec in hopes of launching a second, successful assault, however, the lack of reinforcements and the ravages of smallpox prevented any future attack. This forced the American army to fall back to New York, allowing the British army to take and hold Quebec for the rest of the war. George Washington was facing similar military disasters elsewhere due to smallpox.  Washington understood the grave threat that smallpox posed to his army and their chances of winning the war.

About Smallpox. Most British soldiers at the time of the Revolution were immune to smallpox, but most Americans were not. It was long-known that once a person got smallpox and survived, he usually never got it again. Most people in Europe lived in crowded cities, and as a result, they became exposed to smallpox as small children and survived. They had a lifetime immunity to the disease. However, most Americans at the time lived in the countryside, far away from cities or their neighbors. Most had not been exposed to smallpox until they joined Washington’s army. Living in overcrowded tents and barracks, smallpox spread quickly among them.

The method by which people were vaccinated from smallpox at that time was dangerous. According to published statistics collected by the city of Boston in 1721, about 2% of the people who got the vaccination would get full-blown smallpox from the vaccine and die as a result. However, among unvaccinated people, 14% would die if they got smallpox. Shortly after the war ended, a much safer smallpox vaccine was developed in England

Mandatory Vaccination. In 1775, General Washington ordered that all his soldiers and all new recruits be vaccinated for smallpox. It was the first medical mandate in American history. Washington took a huge gamble. First, he risked mass desertions by soldiers unwilling to be vaccinated. Washington’s vaccination order was a mandate, not a request. Soldiers could not refuse to be vaccinated for religious or any other reason. Second, Washington risked attack by British forces while his men were recuperating from the vaccination, which typically took 5 days or more. Third, he risked censure or worse from Congress for taking such a radical and risky move. Fortunately for Washington, the vaccinations were a huge success. Congress backed Washington’s decision, and few men refused to take the vaccine. Also, fortunately, the British didn’t figure out that a lot of Washington’s men were sick recuperating from the vaccinations until after they were well.

Although we can never know what George Washington would say about vaccinations if he were alive today, history tells us that he supported vaccinations – including mandatory vaccinations. Today, hundreds of companies have vaccine mandates for their employees, and the Supreme Court has backed up the right of private employers to have vaccine mandates. What will Robert F. Kennedy do about employer vaccine mandates when he is Secretary of Health and Human Services? What will he do about school vaccine mandates? 

In 1900, the average American lived 45 years. Today, it is 77 years. We have added over 30 years to life expectancy since 1900. If you ask people why life expectancy in America is so much higher today than it was in 1900, most people will say that it is due to antibiotics, but if you ask doctors, most will tell you it is due to vaccines.