Fewer people have been receiving a measles vaccine because they distrust the government after officials’ actions during the COVID-19 pandemic, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said on April 21.
“If you’re asking why people stopped vaccinating, it’s because the government lied to them during COVID,” Kennedy told the House of Representatives House and Energy Committee’s Subcommittee on Health. “That’s when the vaccination rates dropped.”
Some 95 percent of kindergartners had received an MMR vaccine in the 2019–2020 school year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That percentage dropped to 92.5 percent in the 2024–2025 school year.
Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) spoke during the hearing about how in 2000, measles was declared eliminated in the United States, which means measles has not spread in the country over a sustained period of time.
In 2025, the highest number of measles cases was recorded domestically since 1991, and the number of cases in 2026 is on track to exceed that number.
Dingell said she has been speaking with families in Michigan whose members contracted the infectious disease and asked why they have not been immunized.
“They said, ‘we’re listening to the government. Our government tells us not to,'” Dingell recounted.
Kennedy has said that people should take the MMR vaccine, while noting that it can cause side effects.
“You may think that you’re pro-vaccine, but people aren’t hearing that,” Dingell said, adding later that she was worried that measles has come back after the elimination declaration.
The World Health Organization delayed its meeting on the U.S. elimination status until November, after the midterm elections.
Kennedy said on Tuesday that “I’ve never been anti-vax” but that vaccines “should be safety-tested,” or studied in randomized, placebo-controlled trials. The MMR vaccine has not been, he said.
Kennedy later responded to Dingell, pointing to measles cases also rising in other countries, including Canada. World Health Organization officials have already rescinded the elimination status in Canada and some other countries.
“It has nothing to do with me,” Kennedy said. “It has to do with we have a global epidemic.”
Kennedy also said in the hearing that the allegations that he has somehow caused measles outbreaks are wrong, because most people who have not received a vaccine are older than 5 years of age. That means the decision not to vaccinate predated his early 2025 appointment, he said.
The major outbreak in Texas in 2025 was primarily among orthodox Mennonites. Two Mennonite girls died with measles during the 2025 outbreak. Treating facilities said they died of measles.
Kennedy said that he went to the funeral for one of the girls and spent a day with the family of the other.
“Both of them said when they showed up to the hospital, they were not offered real treatment,” Kennedy said. “Both of them believe that if their children had been properly treated, they would have lived. Personal doctors believe that, too. There’s no child who should die in this country of measles.”
He said that he has focused on making sure doctors are prepared to, and do, treat measles patients, regardless of vaccine status.
Kennedy has been appearing before various congressional panels in recent days after the White House released budget proposals for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and other agencies.
Under questioning during a separate hearing, which took place on April 16, Kennedy said that the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine is safe and effective. He also said that it was possible the measles vaccine could have prevented the death of the children who died in Texas, and defended the Trump administration’s response to the outbreaks of measles in Texas, South Carolina, and other locations.
“We’ve done better at preventing measles and ending the epidemic than any country in the world,” he said.
Rep. Kim Schrier (D-Wash.) on Tuesday said that she opposed the administration’s altered recommendations for the vaccine against hepatitis B, after officials said that newborns should receive it if their mother has hepatitis B or might have the disease, but should not receive it if the mother tests negative for hepatitis B.
She also noted the recent decline in the vitamin K shot for newborns and asked Kennedy to recommend that shot. Kennedy referred the matter to other health officials.
“You spread misinformation and you scare them parents and confuse them,” Schrier told Kennedy. “Parents don’t immunize their children or get them other routine care, and then the kids get sick and they might even die.”
“I’ve never said anything about it,” Kennedy said.
HHS said on X that the vitamin K shot remains the standard of care for newborns. “Its uptake declined during a massive drop in public trust in health care during the Biden era,” the agency stated.
Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.), who spoke after Schrier, noted the back-and-forth between the congresswoman and Kennedy.
“Thanks for trusting moms to make the best decisions for themselves and their families, rather than continuing to perpetuate the narrative that only bureaucrats in Washington can make recommendations and force people into doing things that they know is not best for them and their children,” Cammack told Kennedy.