Next month, an international commission is scheduled to decide whether the United States has lost its official status as a country where measles has been eliminated. We’ve had that status for 26 years.

In Michigan, the share of schoolchildren skipping a required vaccine is the highest in a decade.

And for eight months, the federal government’s own website said two different things.

A page run by the Centers for Disease Control had long told parents: vaccines do not cause autism. Last November, the agency added a line underneath saying scientists cannot rule that out.

The science is not in dispute. Three weeks later, the World Health Organization reviewed 31 studies and concluded vaccines do not cause autism.

The fact(s) of the matter

FactCheck.org called the new wording misleading within a day.

Kathleen Hall Jamieson co-founded FactCheck.org. She also teaches communication at the University of Pennsylvania.

In 2020, the National Academy of Sciences gave her its Public Welfare Medal, the academy’s highest honor, for a “non-partisan crusade to ensure the integrity of facts in public discourse.”

She spoke with host Robyn Vincent about the agency’s mixed message and where people tend to place their trust when their government says two things at once.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

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