To everyone saying broken clock and a glimmer of hope, you just need to read the article that it isn’t. He was just cornered and had no room to wiggle out of it.

Any hope that Kennedy’s measles statement might indicate a change of heart were dashed in the rest of the CNN interview in which he turned combative. Batting off questions from Bash, the health secretary responded with personal attacks.

He accused the CNN host of “saying nonsense”, “repeating like a parrot” and “making assertions you can’t support”. In one especially demeaning remark he said Bash had become “flustered”.

“I’m not flustered at all,” she asserted in a calm voice. “I am frustrated because you are the HHS secretary and you are talking about things that lead to vaccine hesitancy in this country.”

In a further comment dripping with condescension, Kennedy told Bash “you probably don’t understand this because you’re not a scientist”.

The journalist riposted: “But you’re not, either.”

Kennedy used the CNN exchange to spread further misinformation about other aspects of public health. He claimed that both respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) that is a major cause of infant mortality and Lyme disease were caused by manipulation of germs in laboratories.