Claim: There is No Autism Among the Amish Because They Don’t Vaccinate

Validity: False and misleading.

“There are certain groups of people that don’t take vaccines and don’t take any pills, that have no autism. [...] Is that a correct statement by the way?” Trump turns to RFK Jr.

“There are some studies that suggest that, yeah. With the Amish, for example.”

- YouTube

“We did a film about mercury in vaccines... We actually came down to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and we interviewed a doctor down here, who ran a big, big clinic, and he said ‘yeah, I’ve never seen autism among the Amish, we don’t have it.’ [...] the Amish are our control group.”

RFK Jr. Addresses Amish Community, Shares Views on Vaccine Safety and More

(At 1 h 2 min)

RFK Jr. often makes claims that Amish communities have no autism, particularly with an implication that this is because they don’t vaccinate. In this context, he called the Amish a “control group.”

Both aspects of this are incorrect. Firstly, while it is true that vaccination rates in Amish communities are lower than in the non-Amish population, many Amish people do still receive vaccinations. For example, a 2011 survey asked 359 Amish parents if they’d vaccinated their kids, and found that 68% said that all of their children had received at least one vaccination.

A 2016 study on a measles outbreak in a predominantly Amish community found that while 88% of people who caught the disease were not vaccinated initially, over a quarter went on to receive the vaccine shortly afterwards.

In short, it is inaccurate to imply that Amish people are “not vaccinated.”

For the other part of the claim, there isn’t much evidence about autism rates in Amish communities. Based on the second example, RFK Jr. seems to be referencing the work of Dan Olmsted. However, in Olmsted's own work he clearly states that he did indeed identify Amish children with autism.

Preliminary data from a late-2000s survey suggests that Amish communities have an autism rate of around 1 in 271. However, this appears to have not been published in full.

Finally, researchers have identified a gene in Amish children linked to autism and seizures.

It’s true that what little evidence we have suggests low autism rates in Amish communities, but all sources – including the one RFK Jr. likely used – concede that it does exist.