CNN
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President Donald Trump’s pick of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for secretary of the US Division of Well being and Human Companies “is a very unhealthy selection for the well being of the American folks,” Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown College College of Public Well being, warned Thursday.
“I used to be apprehensive we might go low however not this low,” Dr. Carlos del Rio, govt affiliate dean of the Emory College of Drugs & Grady Well being System, wrote of the choose.
Though Trump signaled within the runup to the election that he deliberate to let the vaccine skeptic “go wild” on well being, meals and medication, Kennedy’s official choice for the nation’s prime well being put up despatched shockwaves by means of the general public well being world, involved about his potential results on vaccination charges, analysis on infectious ailments and misrepresentation of established science.
“For too lengthy, People have been crushed by the commercial meals complicated and drug firms who’ve engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation on the subject of Public Well being,” Trump mentioned in an announcement Thursday. “The Security and Well being of all People is crucial position of any Administration, and HHS will play a giant position in serving to be sure that all people shall be shielded from dangerous chemical compounds, pollution, pesticides, pharmaceutical merchandise, and meals components which have contributed to the overwhelming Well being Disaster on this Nation.”
Advocates for public well being didn’t mince phrases with their criticism.
“Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is a transparent and current hazard to the nation’s well being. He shouldn’t be allowed within the constructing on the Division of Well being and Human Companies (HHS), not to mention be positioned in command of the nation’s public well being company,” Robert Weissman, co-president of the buyer advocacy nonprofit Public Citizen, mentioned in an announcement. “Donald Trump’s bungling of public well being coverage through the Covid pandemic price a whole lot of hundreds of lives. By appointing Kennedy as his Secretary of HHS, Trump is courting one other, policy-driven public well being disaster.”
Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Middle for Infectious Illness Analysis and Coverage on the College of Minnesota, advised CNN earlier than the election that he felt compelled to weigh in publicly on Kennedy’s views due to issues about potential Trump insurance policies and what he known as Kennedy’s “pseudoscience.”
“All the things that we see and learn about what a Trump administration would appear to be would devastate public well being on this nation,” mentioned Osterholm, who famous that he’d served in a well being coverage position in each presidential administration since Ronald Reagan’s and thinks of himself as a “nonpartisan public well being soldier.”
However even some skeptics acknowledged that they agree with components of Kennedy’s concepts, together with round fixing the meals system.
Listed below are a few of the areas the place Kennedy has mentioned he’s planning to make change.
In a statement after Thursday’s announcement, Kennedy mentioned he’s desperate to work with HHS staff to rid public well being companies of “company seize” and “clear up corruption.”
“I look ahead to working with the greater than 80,000 staff at HHS to free the companies from the smothering cloud of company seize to allow them to pursue their mission to make People as soon as once more the healthiest folks on Earth,” Kennedy mentioned.
“Collectively we are going to clear up corruption, cease the revolving door between trade and authorities, and return our well being companies to their wealthy custom of gold-standard, evidence-based science. I’ll present People with transparency and entry to all the information to allow them to make knowledgeable decisions for themselves and their households,” he continued.
A number of key companies such because the US Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention and the US Meals and Drug Administration fall underneath the HHS umbrella, and Kennedy fired a broadside on the FDA late final month.
“FDA’s struggle on public well being is about to finish,” he mentioned in a social media post. “This consists of its aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, uncooked milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, nutritional vitamins, clear meals, sunshine, train, nutraceuticals and the rest that advances human well being and might’t be patented by Pharma. In the event you work for the FDA and are a part of this corrupt system, I’ve two messages for you: 1. Protect your data, and a couple of. Pack your luggage.”
That warning adopted comments Kennedy has made about ending Nationwide Institutes of Well being analysis into infectious ailments, placing medical doctors within the area on edge.
“Infectious ailments are very a lot part of our current and shall be very a lot part of our future, and he desires to cease finding out them?” Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Schooling Middle and an infectious ailments doctor at Youngsters’s Hospital of Philadelphia, advised CNN.
Routine childhood vaccinations are projected to forestall a whole lot of thousands and thousands of diseases, tens of thousands and thousands of hospitalizations and greater than 1 million deaths amongst folks born between 1994 and 2023, in keeping with the CDC. Vaccines are completely examined earlier than their launch, and their security is monitored on an ongoing foundation.
Nevertheless, Kennedy has promoted false claims about vaccination for years and founded the nonprofit Youngsters’s Well being Protection, which promotes anti-vaccine materials such because the latest documentary “Vaxed III: Licensed to Kill.”
In July 2023, Kennedy advised Fox Information host Jesse Watters that vaccines trigger autism, a declare that has been repeatedly disproved. Amongst other things, he has additionally misstated the contents of vaccines, falsely claimed there may be convincing proof that the 1918 influenza pandemic and HIV each originated with vaccine analysis, and repeatedly touted misinformation about Covid-19 vaccines.
The day after the election, nonetheless, Kennedy mentioned he was “not going to remove anyone’s vaccines. I’ve by no means been anti-vaccine. I’m going to verify the scientific security research and efficacies are on the market, and other people could make particular person assessments about whether or not that product goes to be good for them.”
Many public well being consultants are skeptical. Dr. Jason Schwartz, an affiliate professor on the Yale College of Public Well being, mentioned the softened stance was an “eleventh hour try and sanitize his popularity and rebrand himself as an affordable champion of power illness prevention.”
Kennedy has mentioned the second Trump administration would advise that fluoride be faraway from the nation’s water provide. “On January 20, the Trump White Home will advise all U.S. water methods to take away fluoride from public water. Fluoride is an industrial waste related to arthritis, bone fractures, bone most cancers, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental problems, and thyroid illness,” he wrote in a social media put up.
Fluoride, a mineral discovered naturally within the atmosphere and in some meals, may also be a byproduct of sure industries. It has been added to many public water methods throughout the nation since 1945 in an effort to forestall tooth decay by strengthening the protecting outer layer of enamel. Greater than 60% of the US inhabitants — about 209 million folks — are served by ingesting water methods which were fluoridated, in keeping with CDC information.
Excessive ranges of fluoride have been linked with lowered IQ in kids, in keeping with a federal evaluate, however the American Dental Affiliation calls fluoridated water “the one best public well being measure to forestall tooth decay.”
In September, a federal choose ordered the US Environmental Safety Company to take extra measures to manage fluoride in ingesting water due to the potential danger to kids’s mental development.
US District Choose Edward Chen dominated that whereas it’s not clear whether or not the quantity of fluoride usually added to water is inflicting a drop in IQ in children, there’s sufficient danger to warrant investigation and that the EPA must take additional motion in regulating it. The ruling didn’t state what actions the EPA must take, and the company is reviewing the choice.
“I believe fluoride is on the best way out due to that courtroom choice,” Kennedy advised MSNBC final week. “I believe the sooner it goes out, the higher. I’m not going to compel anyone to take it out, however I’m going to advise the water districts about their authorized legal responsibility, their authorized obligation to their service to their constituents. And I’m going to provide them good details about the science, and I believe fluoride will disappear.”
Some consultants agree that regardless of the politicization of the difficulty, extra analysis is required to know the impact on fluoride – not simply on younger kids however for the overall inhabitants, as effectively.
Dr. Ashley Malin, assistant professor within the Division of Epidemiology within the College of Florida’s Faculty of Public Well being and Well being Professions, advised CNN in an e mail that “defending susceptible populations from environmental toxicants is a nonpartisan matter that ought to stay knowledgeable by the present state of the science.”
“I believe that well being results of fluoride on younger kids, significantly within the realm of neurodevelopment, have been sufficiently studied such that it has now been recognized {that a} hazard to little one IQ is current. Nevertheless, I’d argue that extra analysis is required to higher perceive impacts of power low stage fluoride publicity on grownup well being outcomes as a result of that analysis is scarce,” Malin mentioned.
Kennedy has advocated for regulating chemical compounds in meals and limiting entry to soda and processed meals by means of faculty lunches and the Supplemental Vitamin Help Program – in addition to proposing an thought to swap tallow fat in for seed oils to make McDonald’s french fries more healthy.
Kennedy’s messaging on meals coverage has resonated with some well being consultants in that area.
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“They’re calling for fixing the meals system, doing one thing to coordinate and deal with diet-related power ailments, stopping company energy, eliminating conflicts of curiosity between trade and authorities, getting poisonous chemical compounds out of the meals provide, and doing all the things potential to refocus the meals atmosphere and dietary recommendation on well being,” meals coverage researcher Marion Nestle wrote on her Meals Politics weblog.
She was referring to a roundtable dialogue on vitamin and coverage led by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin, which concerned Kennedy and others who Nestle described as “primarily influencers.”
“These are issues I’ve been writing about right here for years,” she mentioned on her weblog. “It’s laborious to argue with any of this and I gained’t.”
Nestle expressed extra skepticism when reached by e mail earlier than the election, telling CNN that whereas she shares a few of the identical objectives, “we now have no proof” that Kennedy “can or will” accomplish any of them, “and loads of proof from Trump’s presidency that public well being, schooling and well being care will undergo.”
CNN’s Carma Hassan, Nadia Kounang, Daniel Dale and Aaron Pellish contributed to this report.