US vaccine chief jumps ship citing RFK ‘lies’: media

The top US vaccine official resigned on Friday, citing the “misinformation and lies” he said were being peddled by the incoming health secretary, reports said, reports AFP.

According to both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Peter Marks was forced out of the Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine division, as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes charge.

Kennedy is a noted vaccine sceptic, while Marks has worked at the FDA since 2012 and was part of the US effort to roll out inoculations during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In a resignation letter cited by the newspapers, Marks complained of an “unprecedented assault on scientific truth” being pushed by Kennedy and his supporters.

“It has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the Secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies,” he said.

During President Donald Trump’s first term, the US leader was proud of his administration’s “Project Warp Speed” development of vaccines to control spread of coronavirus.

But when he came to power for a second term in January, he appointed 71-year-old Kennedy, who has long peddled unsupported theories that vaccines are ineffective or trigger childhood disease.

Last year 75 Nobel laureates urged the US Senate to oppose Kennedy’s nomination, but he was confirmed in February with only one member of the Republican majority voting against it.

According to the WSJ, an HHS spokesman responded to Marks’ resignation by saying if he “does not want to get behind restoring science to its golden standard and promoting radical transparency, then he has no place at FDA under the strong leadership of Secretary Kennedy.”