Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician from Louisiana, publicly rebuked President Donald Trump on Sunday for claiming that the combined MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine is "sort of like a nuclear weapon" and calling for it to be replaced with six separate shots. Cassidy told CNN the proposal would force parents to make six doctor visits instead of two, result in six injections per child rather than two, and ultimately drive up insurance premiums — concluding that "the president is wrong." The rebuke comes amid broader concern that the Trump administration, led in part by health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, a longtime anti-vaccine activist, has allowed the CDC to alter its website to cast doubt on the scientific consensus that vaccines do not cause autism.