Generation Rescue is a nonprofit organization that advocates the scientifically disproven[3] view that autism and related disorders are primarily caused by environmental factors, particularly vaccines.
[14] Because of Generation Rescue's public profile through national advertising and because its point of view is not shared by the mainstream medical community, its message has been controversial,[15] and the organization has been described as anti-vaccine.
[6] It recommends lollipops enriched with vitamins sold by a company co-founded by Stan Kurtz and owned by Candace McDonald, who have been respectively a President of Generation Rescue and its executive director for ten years.
[6][7] On June 19, 2017, Generation Rescue held a fundraising event in St. Charles, Illinois with Jenny McCarthy and husband Donnie Wahlberg, with part of the proceeds to be put aside for the construction of an integrative health clinic.
[21] The lawsuit was settled; while the terms of the settlement are confidential, title to the site of the proposed clinic was relinquished to the contractor, who had intended to redraw the building's floor plans and finish individual suites.
The choice of speakers at these conferences led critics to accuse both organizations of promoting unproven therapies, such as the Miracle Mineral Solution, as a purported cure for autism.
"[27][28] However, Wakefield's work has been characterized as "an elaborate fraud",[29] and parental fears over vaccines sparked by the controversy, and by continued advocacy of the disproven theory by groups such as Generation Rescue despite, have led, in turn, to decreased immunization rates and an increased incidence of whooping cough and measles, a highly contagious and sometimes deadly disease.
Generation Rescue issued a statement that the "media circus" following the revelation of Wakefield's fraud and manipulation of data was "much ado about nothing".