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The man tapped by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to run a clinical trial looking to tie vaccines to autism has been charged with practicing medicine without a license, given autistic children a dangerous drug not approved for use in the U.S. and improperly prescribed puberty blockers.

In 2011, the Maryland Board of Physicians charged David Geier, who is not a physician and has only a bachelor’s degree, with illegally practicing medicine alongside his father, Mark Geier, a doctor who died last month. The two treated children with Lupron, a drug used to lower testosterone or estrogen levels in patients with prostate cancer, endometriosis and other diseases, along with chelation therapy, which leaches heavy metals from the body, as in lead poisoning.

Those treatments follow a widely discredited theory that blames autism on exposure to mercury in preservatives used in vaccines. Kennedy has promulgated that theory even though more than two dozen large, rigorous studies have discredited any link between vaccines and autism.

Autistic advocates decried Kennedy’s appointment, fearing his refusal to give up on efforts to establish one would refocus federal resources on finding a “cure” for what most scientists now believe is a naturally occurring human neurotype.  

“Anyone who would fleece families with fake cures should not be trusted to interpret a scientific study, let alone conduct one,” the Autistic Self Advocacy Network said in a statement decrying David Geier’s hiring. “This move toward conspiracy theories and junk science puts all our lives at risk.”

A request for comment from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services was not immediately answered. The Geiers’ Institute of Chronic Illnesses, Inc., does not have a website.   

The network’s statement calls Kennedy’s selection of Geier “a clear indication that the Trump administration plans to rig the upcoming study and claim that it proves vaccines cause autism.

Autistic advocates decried Kennedy’s appointment, fearing his refusal to give up on efforts to establish one would refocus federal resources on finding a “cure” for what most scientists now believe is a naturally occurring human neurotype.  

“Anyone who would fleece families with fake cures should not be trusted to interpret a scientific study, let alone conduct one,” the Autistic Self Advocacy Network said in a statement decrying David Geier’s hiring. “This move toward conspiracy theories and junk science puts all our lives at risk.”

A request for comment from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services was not immediately answered. The Geiers’ Institute of Chronic Illnesses, Inc., does not have a website.   

The network’s statement calls Kennedy’s selection of Geier “a clear indication that the Trump administration plans to rig the upcoming study and claim that it proves vaccines cause autism. This will set public health back decades at a time when vaccine hesitancy and infectious disease are both spreading at alarming rates.”

Among other claims, the Maryland board found that the Geiers diagnosed precocious puberty — a medical condition where children’s bodies mature too early — in an unusually large number of patients, did so without using the standard protocol for establishing whether the children in fact had the condition and failed to tell their families that the chelation drug prescribed was not authorized for use in the United States. 

Mark Geier’s medical licenses eventually were suspended by the seven states where he and his son operated autism treatment centers under a variety of names, including the Genetic Centers of America. The Geiers conducted several studies linking vaccines to autism, only to have them retracted and withdrawn from publication by scientific journals. They have testified in hundreds of lawsuits brought by people who claim to have been injured by immunizations. 

Lupron is a brand name for a GnRH analogue drug that pauses puberty without causing permanent physical changes. The drugs are sometimes prescribed for children who experience gender nonconformity or gender dysphoria at the onset of puberty. 

In January, a large-scale study published in JAMA Pediatrics found the drugs were prescribed for fewer than 0.1% of youth in an insurance claims database covering more than 5 million patients ages 8 to 17. Only 926 youth with a gender-related diagnosis received puberty blockers from 2018 through 2022. No patient under the age of 12 was given the drugs.

Nonetheless, in recent years, 26 states have banned gender-affirming care for young people. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on challenges to the laws. In a January executive order, President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies to restrict such care.