A top doctor has told the Mirror that Donald Trump’s new comments on the MMR vaccine are ‘putting the lives of children at risk’ – and echo the fraudulent claims of Andrew Wakefield
Donald Trump’s new comments on the MMR vaccine are a ‘threat to child health’, a top doctor has told the Mirror.
The US president – who earlier this week urged women not to take paracetamol during pregnancy – today issued controversial new advice on childhood vaccinations, claiming parents should insist that their children are given measles, mumps and rubella jabs in “three totally separate” doses.
His suggestions fly in the face of existing advice from public health officials on both sides of the Atlantic, who say there is no scientific evidence that separate jabs are safer than the combined MMR vaccine, and that they can leave children vulnerable to dangerous diseases for longer.
Dr Michael Head, a global health researcher based in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Southampton, has warned that Trump’s new claims – and the ‘alternative medicines’ repeatedly advocated by US Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy in the place of vaccines – risk putting the lives of children at risk.
He told the Mirror: “This is a problem. There are so many measles cases across most of the world, including richer countries such as the USA, UK and Europe. Children are being hospitalised and dying of measles, which is tragic, unnecessary and completely preventable.
“Measles is more infectious than any of the Covid variants, but transmission and illness is preventable with two doses of the MMR vaccine. Rubella, the ‘R’ part of MMR, is a very dangerous virus to pregnant women, greatly increasing the risk of stillbirth and miscarriage.”
“We really need a very high uptake of the safe and effective MMR vaccine, to keep children and pregnant women safe. The vaccine is recommended by the NHS and World Health Organization.
“Comments like those from Trump and Robert F Kennedy are a threat to child health. It’s also worth remembering that during the pandemic, Trump suggested injecting bleach may be a way to cure COVID-19. He does not have a good track record of sensible public health advice.”
The expert also highlighted how Trump’s comments this week appeared to echo the discredited claims of Andrew Wakefield, who was struck off 15 years ago after the British Medical Journal found his study identifying a link between autism and the MMR vaccine was based on fraudulent research.
Despite later being retracted by the Lancet medical journal, Wakefield’s 1998 paper has been blamed for fanning misinformation and contributing to plummeting rates of infant vaccine uptake in the early years of the 21st century – leading to a resurgence in infections that were once thought banished to history.
This year, the US has faced its largest measles outbreak in more than three decades, with 1,514 cases and 40 outbreaks confirmed as of late September 2025.
The NHS, meanwhile, continues to encourage catch-up MMR jabs after it emerged that, in London, only 73.3% of children were fully vaccinated by age five in 2023/24 – well below the World Health Organization target of 95%.
Explaining how Wakefield’s claims came to be discredited, Dr Head added: “The MMR vaccine is both safe and effective. There is quite literally decades worth of evidence to support that conclusion.
“The claims around this vaccine causing autism are false. The claims come from a retracted scientific paper from over 20 years ago, which included just 12 children.
“This paper was written by Andrew Wakefield, who was struck off from being a doctor. The British Medical Journal (BMJ) produced a series of articles, one of which was entitled ‘Wakefield’s article linking MMR vaccine and autism was fraudulent’.
“In essence, Wakefield’s reporting to the data in relation to these 12 children was completely wrong. He also did not have the correct ethical approval to carry out the research in the first place.”