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Katie Weisman has left our world. We are forced to face an unfillable void. The news has struck fellow advocates and the entire vaccine injury and autism communities like a lightning bolt.

Although Katie had been fighting cancer for a long time and was very sick in the last few months, many of us were lulled into a false sense of security that Katie would be fine because she was such a fighter. She was always correct and she always had a plan. We believed she would pull through because that’s what Katie always did.

Full of tenacity, Katie was the most kind-hearted and compassionate warrior you could ever meet. Intelligent, frank and passionate, she would stand her ground on the science and policy all while keeping an even keel.

Never turning down an opportunity to help, Katie was always there, lending her support and time to write thoughtful and helpful articles, or visiting lawmakers at the state house or Congress. She was steadfast and dependable. Always.

Most people have no idea that when they would read an Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network research analysis from Children’s Health Defense (CHD) or SafeMinds or the Age of Autism that it had Katie’s fingerprints all over it. No one knew the tricks and the lengths that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would use to cherry pick and present the autism data like Katie.

Most recently, Katie’s attention went to Vitamin D research for COVID-19. She offered several articles about how Vitamin D supplementation can help with and prevent COVID-19 infection. Her focus on Vitamin D came well before others began echoing her findings. She would tell us how important it was to get this critical Vitamin D/COVID-19 connection information out to people because it would “save lives.”

If only we could have saved Katie’s.

When Katie’s triplet sons were diagnosed with autism, they had varying levels of mercury in their bodies from thimerosal-containing vaccines. This led Katie to embark on a camaraderie with other “mercury moms” that lasted the rest of her life. It was, and is, a club no parent ever wants to be a member of. But when we found ourselves there, none of us could ever look back.

Like all of us, Katie set out to save every child she could. She did that to her dying day. There are children now that don’t have “autism” because of Katie Weisman. They will never know, nor will their parents know, that they were spared because of her advocacy and research.

Those of us at CHD and all others in the vaccine safety community will be forever grateful for Katie’s life and how it touched ours. In a recent prayer group of friends and loved ones, CHD Chairman Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sent Katie this message and we think it captures what we all want to say to her:

“Katie, you are in my daily prayers. I want you to know what an indispensable asset you are to our movement and to this organization, but you are also an awe-inspiring example of courage to me personally. Thank you. Love, Bobby.”

In lieu of flowers and to honor Katie’s memory, the family asks that donations be made to the Children’s Health Defense Katherine G. Weisman Fellowship. The annual fund will allow others to continue the scientific writing, research and analysis at which Katie excelled.