Two days after initially downplaying the outbreak as “not unusual,” the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, on Friday said he recognizes the serious impact of the ongoing measles epidemic in Texas – in which a child died recently – and said the government is providing resources, including protective vaccines.

“Ending the measles outbreak is a top priority for me and my extraordinary team,” Kennedy – an avowed anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist who for years has sown doubts about the safety and efficacy of vaccines – said in a post on X.

Kennedy said his federal Department of Health and Human Services would send Texas 2,000 doses of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine – typically meant to be given to children in a series of two shots at 12 to 15 months old as well as between the ages of four and six years old – through its immunization program.

  • Elizabeth @lemm.ee
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    18 days ago

    With Nazis running the show I don’t think giving them a monopoly on force is a good idea.

    • neatchee@lemmy.world
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      18 days ago

      If you think the type of arms you can get your hands on will help one iota you are gravely mistaken

      Should the people ever need to fight the government of the US there are only two things that will matter:

      1. How much of the military joins which side

      2. Which nations supply each side with arms

      Either the people get some of the military on their side (along with the planes, tanks, drones, etc they bring along) and are propped up by foreign interests, or the military steamrolls any resistance.

      This has been true in every major conflict in the last several decades. You either have the support of military assets and foreign governments or you lose.

        • neatchee@lemmy.world
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          18 days ago

          Cool cool cool. So let’s do an experiment. I’ll take a A-10 Warthog (and pilot) with its 30mm GAU-8 Avenger. You take a Walther PPK. Since the size of the gun doesn’t matter, just who you point it at, you should come out on top, right?

          Your sophistry is just gun lobby propaganda in a pretty package.

      • onecarmel@lemm.ee
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        18 days ago

        If it comes to that, at least I can take as many of them with me as I can lmao

        • neatchee@lemmy.world
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          18 days ago

          Good luck shooting the operator of the drone that wipes out your apartment complex. Or the tank driver. Or the F16 pilot.

          In 2022 there were 47 fatalities in the US just from school shootings alone.

          Meanwhile, in the war in Gaza, the IDF death toll - facing an opposition backed by multiple governments, Hezbollah, and Hamas - is 844 since Oct 7 2023

          Like, I’m not even a “ban all guns” person. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to own a gun

          Fighting the gubment ain’t one of 'em. It’s a joke.

          • onecarmel@lemm.ee
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            18 days ago

            Doubt they’ll be carpet bombing neighborhoods on our own soil lmao. Just talking about the idiots walking around carrying guns on their own terms

            Anyways what’s this have to do with Gaza? Got more things to worry about here with keeping my wife and kids safe from crazies.

            And any deaths are awful, but that’s a terrible stat to try to use. That’s not even an average of one person per state… there’s about 350 million people in the US

            • neatchee@lemmy.world
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              18 days ago

              The point is that if the total IDF death count in Gaza is that low after more than year of fighting, you and your rifle aren’t gonna do shit against the government if they’re able to convince the military to attack Americans on their own soil.

              Like I said, I’m not trying to ban guns outright. If you want to defend your family from other crazy civilians with guns, I can appreciate that.

              But this conversation started with a comment about Nazis being in power. You cannot fight that kind of power with the firearms available to civilians. Only other civilians with equally weak armaments

              And my original comment was simply pointing out the hypocrisy of reversing course on vaccines when kids start dying when there are thousands of deaths every year, dozens of which are children in schools, and our leadership won’t even consider strengthening background checks or banning bump stocks