Video reveals physician with measles treating youngsters. RFK Jr. later praised him as an ‘extraordinary’ healer

A Texas physician who has been treating kids in a measles outbreak was proven on video with a measles rash on his face in a clinic per week earlier than Well being Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. met him and praised him as an “extraordinary” healer.

Dr. Ben Edwards appeared within the video posted March 31 by the anti-vaccine group Kennedy as soon as led, Youngsters’s Well being Protection. In it, Edwards seems carrying scrubs and speaking with mother and father and kids in a makeshift clinic he arrange in Seminole, Texas, floor zero of the outbreak that has sickened a whole lot of individuals and killed three, together with two kids.

Edwards is requested whether or not he had measles, and he responded, “Sure,” then mentioned his an infection began the day earlier than the video was recorded.

“Yesterday was fairly achy. Little delicate fever. Spots got here within the afternoon. Immediately, I wakened feeling good,” Edwards mentioned within the video.

Measles is most contagious for about 4 days earlier than and 4 days after the rash seems and is likely one of the world’s most contagious ailments, in line with the U.S. Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention. Docs and public well being specialists mentioned Edwards’ choice to enter the clinic put kids, their mother and father and their group in danger as a result of he may have unfold it to others. They mentioned there was no situation during which Edwards’ conduct can be affordable.

Kennedy met with Edwards a couple of week after the video was posted by Youngsters’s Well being Protection, the group Kennedy led for years till December. In an April 6 submit on X, Kennedy mentioned he “visited with these two extraordinary healers,” together with Edwards and one other physician, and praised their use of two unproven remedies for measles.

At the same time as measles has exploded in Texas and unfold throughout the nation, Kennedy, the nation’s high well being official, has declined to persistently and forcefully encourage folks to vaccinate their kids and remind them that the vaccine is protected. Kennedy’s submit drawing consideration to Edwards is inappropriate however unsurprising given Kennedy’s file, mentioned Dr. Craig Spencer, a medical physician who can be a professor on the Brown College College of Public Well being.

“I believe is sadly completely on-brand for a way he thinks that drugs needs to be practiced,” Spencer mentioned. “And that’s what makes me remarkably uncomfortable and very involved and scared for the following three-and-a-half years.”

It was unclear whether or not Kennedy knew that Edwards had gone into his clinic whereas contaminated with measles earlier than assembly him. A spokesperson for Kennedy mentioned he isn’t anti-vaccine and that he’s “dedicated to bettering kids’s well being in America and has re-deployed sources to Texas to assist with the present outbreak.” He didn’t reply why the well being secretary selected to satisfy with and reward Edwards fairly than any of the opposite medical doctors in West Texas who’ve been treating kids within the outbreak.

Edwards instructed The Related Press in an e-mail that he “interacted with zero sufferers that weren’t already contaminated with measles” in the course of the time he was infectious. “Due to this fact, clearly, there have been no sufferers that had been put at risk of buying measles since they already had measles.”

However Jessica Steier, a public well being scientist, mentioned the video reveals Edwards within the room with individuals who don’t seem sick, together with mother and father of sick kids and the individuals who visited the clinic from Youngsters’s Well being Protection. She additionally questioned what steps Edwards was taking to verify folks had been sick with measles, fairly than counting on guesswork.

Steier, who runs the Science Literacy Lab and co-wrote an article about Edwards’ conduct, mentioned whereas there could also be some extraordinary emergencies the place it will be applicable for a sick physician to work, this isn’t a type of conditions as a result of there is no such thing as a scarcity of suppliers who are usually not contaminated. She additionally identified that the video reveals Edwards was not carrying a masks.

“You will have the HHS secretary lifting him up,” she mentioned. “You realize, it’s so, so harmful. I actually really feel for the people who find themselves on the bottom.”

Youngsters’s Well being Protection has sued a variety of information organizations, amongst them the AP, accusing them of violating antitrust legal guidelines by taking motion to determine misinformation, together with concerning the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines.

Kennedy’s promotion of a health care provider who has touted unproven measles remedies is “wholly irresponsible” however is according to Kennedy’s lengthy public file of anti-vaccine views, mentioned Dr. Paul Offit, a pediatrician at Youngsters’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He mentioned Kennedy has carried these views to his new job as the pinnacle of the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Providers.

“He’s not the director of Youngsters’s Well being Protection anymore. He’s chargeable for the well being and well-being of youngsters on this nation,” Offit mentioned. “It’s an emergency, however Kennedy just isn’t treating it that method.”

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