Paging Dr. Trump

The Oval Office Pediatrics Clinic

I never imagined that one qualification for rewriting America’s childhood vaccine schedule would be having once taken your own children to the pediatrician, but Trump continues to expand the résumé requirements for president, and come to think of it, I doubt if he ever took any of his children to a pediatrician. I don’t think he was a hands-on dad.

On Monday, he signed an executive order calling for fewer childhood vaccines at each appointment, more visits, and separate shots for measles, mumps and rubella. Trump’s explanation was partly personal. He claims he spaced vaccines for his children and “had no problem.”

I once ate canned frosting as a child and survived. Betty Crocker still shouldn’t run the FDA.

Trump also talked about “vats” of vaccine being pumped into children and compared the amount to a bottle of soda.

That sounds alarming until you remember that vaccine doses are measured in milliliters, not something handed through a drive through window with a straw.

The childhood immunization schedule wasn’t invented by pediatricians throwing darts at a calendar. It developed through decades of research into when vaccines safely produce protection against diseases that used to kill and disable children routinely.

The proposed MMR change is especially baffling. Trump wants the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine separated into three shots, although individual versions aren’t currently sold in the United States.

Public health experts warn that separating MMR can delay protection and create more chances for children to miss a dose. Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who is also a doctor, criticized the order immediately.

He pointed out that splitting vaccines can actually mean more shots. So we’re reducing the number of shots by increasing the number of shots. I’m beginning to understand why Washington needs such a large budget.

I get suspicious when politicians use “choice” as wrapping paper for policies that can make genuine choice more difficult.

Parents absolutely should ask questions about childhood vaccines. They should get answers too, preferably from people who studied immunology rather than people who recently discovered the word “jab.”

Federal vaccine recommendations matter because they influence medical practice, state policy and insurance coverage. Changing them isn’t some philosophical exercise conducted over lunch. Families can end up paying the price, literally and medically.

The sentence that shook me to the core was Trump’s assurance that “nothing bad can happen” from these changes.

Anyone who has spent five minutes around medicine knows how reckless that sounds. Medicine is about evidence, probability, benefit and risk. Scientists revise conclusions because new evidence warrants it, not because somebody behind the Resolute Desk has developed strong feelings about fluid volume.

Vaccines have been so successful that many Americans no longer remember what the diseases looked like. That’s an extraordinary achievement and a dangerous luxury.

Measles becomes theoretical when you’ve never watched a child struggle through it. Polio sounds historical when you’ve never known someone who lived with its consequences.

If the Trump administration has compelling evidence for changing the childhood vaccine schedule, put it on the table. Let pediatricians, epidemiologists and immunologists examine it publicly. Good science can survive scrutiny.

What I don’t want is national vaccine policy written from presidential memory, instinct and tv- friendly imagery. Trump doesn’t need to become a vaccine expert. He needs enough judgment to recognize one when one walks into the room, the moron.