WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on February 12 criticized President Donald Trump, saying his moves to alter U.S. childhood vaccination policies disregard 'decades of evidence' from science.
Tedros's warning came days after Trump signed an executive order calling for a review of mandatory school vaccination requirements and revived a proposal to split the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine into three separate doses.
U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has long promoted the debunked claim that the MMR vaccine causes autism, is now leading an effort to review traditional vaccines, rewrite the childhood immunization schedule, and cut funding for new vaccine development.
However, Tedros insisted science has proven clearly: 'Vaccines, including the MMR vaccine, are safe and do not cause autism.' He stressed that 'vaccination policies should be based on rigorous, independent, and transparent review based on the best available scientific evidence, not political pressure.'
He also warned that 'delaying vaccination or unnecessarily splitting vaccine doses does not make vaccination safer but may leave children unprotected.'
