Peter Hotez

During Texas's largest measles outbreak in decades, Hotez attributed the vulnerability of certain communities to declining vaccination coverage and strongly criticised Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s messages about natural immunity, vitamin A and other treatments. He accused the Health Secretary of spreading misinformation by downplaying the risks of the disease or the value of the MMR vaccine.

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Directly implicated

Following announcements by the Trump/Kennedy administration about a possible association between acetaminophen use during pregnancy and autism, and then a statement by Kennedy linking circumcision, Tylenol use and autism diagnosis, Hotez denounced these explanations as excessively simplistic and called the latter claim 'absurd' and 'increasingly untethered to reality'. He emphasised the major role of genetics and the complexity of environmental factors.

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Hotez's critics noted that an NIH grant for SARS vaccine research on which he was principal investigator referred to the risk of accidental laboratory release and that collaborators linked to the project appeared in work on recombinant coronaviruses. U.S. Right to Know presented this as funding that had contributed to 'gain-of-function' work associated with Wuhan researchers, while Hotez was criticising congressional investigations on the subject.

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Hotez described a coordinated 'anti-science aggression' linking certain conservative elected officials, media outlets, anti-vaccine movements and think tanks, and invoked the phenomenon of 'red COVID' — higher mortality in more Republican and less vaccinated areas — to argue that political extremism had caused preventable deaths. His political opponents attacked this analysis as partisan and stigmatising.

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Hotez long considered a natural origin the best available explanation and strongly challenged claims that SARS-CoV-2 had been deliberately engineered. As debate over an accidental laboratory leak regained legitimacy in scientific and intelligence investigations, critics cited his earlier wording as excessively categorical.

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After Hotez denounced an interview of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. by Joe Rogan as misinformation, Rogan offered 100,000 dollars to a charity if Hotez agreed to an unlimited debate with Kennedy. Hotez refused that format while saying he was willing to speak with Rogan. Elon Musk and other public figures criticised him openly; activists subsequently appeared outside his home to confront him.

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Hotez published 'Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel's Autism', drawing on his experience as the father of an autistic daughter and as a vaccinologist to challenge theories linking vaccination and autism. He used very strong language against certain anti-vaccine theories, prompting a fierce activist response and increasing personalisation of the debate around his family.

State of the evidence

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Directly implicated