In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the discredited notion that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. And among those diseases could be COVID-19.
Unfortunately, Republican politicians and conservative media figures are increasingly joining up with the anti-vaxxers. Even before COVID, they were fighting vaccine mandates and other public health measures.
Amid shifting attitudes toward childhood vaccines, many adults – including parents – continue to report hearing myths that MMR vaccines are linked to autism, and many are uncertain about whether to believe this false claim. About two-thirds (63%) of adults overall and parents (67%) say they have heard the false claim that the MMR vaccines have been proven to cause autism in children, a claim that began with a since-retracted study in the 1990s and has recently been associated with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. The share reporting they have heard this claim remains unchanged since 2023.
As previous KFF polls have found when it comes to health misinformation on a range of topics, many adults fall in the “malleable middle,” expressing some level of uncertainty about this false health claim. Just three percent of adults say it is “definitely true” that the MMR vaccines have been proven to cause autism in children. A larger share (20%) is open to believing the myth, saying it is “probably true,” while many lean toward the correct answer but still express uncertainty, saying the claim is “probably false” (41%). One-third of adults say it is “definitely false.” Most Republicans and independents fall into this malleable middle category, with substantial shares saying the claim is “probably false,” while half of Democrats say this claim is “definitely false.” Notably, just about one in ten parents who identify or lean Republican (11%) say this claim is “definitely false.”
Belief in the myth that the MMR vaccine causes autism is correlated with parents’ decisions about their children’s vaccinations. Among parents who say it is “probably” or “definitely” true that the MMR vaccines have been proven to cause autism, nearly four in ten (37%) say they have delayed or skipped some childhood vaccines for their children, compared to just eight percent of parents who say this myth is “probably” or “definitely” false.
