Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been nominated to lead the top U.S. health agency, sparking alarm among health experts.
On Thursday, US President-elect Donald Trump announced that Kennedy would be his nominee for secretary of Health and Human Services, saying he would “make America great and healthy again!”
Kennedy, grandson of former US President John F. Kennedy, withdrew from the presidential election in late August
If his nomination is confirmed by the Senate, he will oversee a number of health care organizations with about 80,000 employees and a multibillion-dollar budget.
Health experts reacted with alarm given Kennedy’s record
Ashwin Vasan, former New York City health commissioner, said Kennedy’s nomination would potentially have “devastating consequences for the health of Americans.”
“There are aspects of our health that only work when we do things together… While there are always things to improve, what I hear and what everyone says publicly, is interested in tearing down that infrastructure.”
Here are just some of the reasons why Trump’s nomination of Kennedy scared health experts.
Vaccines and autism
As president of the group Children’s Health Defense, known for its anti-vaccination misinformation, Kennedy spread controversial and unfounded ideas about vaccines.
A 2021 report from the British-American Center for Countering Digital Hate listed Kennedy among the top 12 spreaders of anti-vaccine content online
In 2015, Kennedy linked autism to vaccines.
“They give the injection and that night they have a fever of 103 [degrees]they go to sleep and three months later their brain is no longer there. What this is causing to our country is a Holocaust,” he said.
Later, he apologized for his “use of the word to describe the autism epidemic,” but did not backtrack on his claims.
In a 2023 interview with Fox News, Kennedy said he “believes[s] autism comes from vaccines.”
Although signs of autism often emerge around the time children receive the MMR vaccine, many researchers deny any link between the two.
A research article published in the journal ScienceDirect in 2014 found that “vaccinations are not associated with the development of autism or autism spectrum disorder.” A 2004 report from the Institute of Medicine contained similar findings.
In a post on X in October, Kennedy said he “won’t take away anyone’s vaccines.”
“I just want to make sure that every American knows the safety profile, the risk profile and the effectiveness of each vaccine. That’s it,” he said.
Fluoride loss and IQ
Kennedy also promised that the Trump White House will advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water.
“Fluoride is an industrial waste associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders and thyroid disease,” he said in a post on X.
Fluoridation was first introduced into the U.S. water system starting in 1945. Today, it is present in the water consumed by two-thirds of Americans.
Fluoride is a natural mineral that helps strengthen teeth and prevent tooth decay, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) named fluoridation one of the “Ten Great Public Health Achievements” of the 20th century. century.
A 2024 literature review published in ScienceDirect found that 12 out of 14 studies showed no clear link between fluoride and primary bone tumors.
According to the US National Toxicology Program, there is “insufficient data to determine whether the low fluoride level of 0.7 mg/L currently recommended for community water supplies has an adverse effect on the IQ of children.”
A 2023 meta-analysis published in ScienceDirect found “a general indication of dose-dependent adverse effects of fluoride on cognitive neurodevelopment in children,” but said there were “uncertainties both about the causal nature of such a relationship and about the exact exposure thresholds involved”.
Emotional and behavioral development, memory and self-control were the same in children who drank fluoridated water and those who did not,
In Australia, fluoride was first added to drinking water in Tasmania in 1953 and is now found in tap water consumed by 90% of Australians
New Zealand, Hong Kong, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Canada are just some of the other countries enriching their water supplies with fluoride.
Raw milk
Kennedy also supported the health benefits of drinking raw milk.
“Since I was here last year, I have only drank raw milk,” she said at the 2022 Children’s Health Advocacy Conference.
In an October post on X, he accused the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of suppressing raw milk.
“The FDA’s war on public health is coming to an end,” he said.
Research published by the American Journal of Public Health in 2011 found that consumption of raw milk was linked to numerous foodborne illness outbreaks reported in the United States between 1973 and 1992.
According to the CDC, from 1998 to 2018, “202 outbreaks related to raw milk consumption occurred in the United States. These outbreaks resulted in 2,645 illnesses and 228 hospitalizations.”
The sale of unpasteurised milk has been banned in Australia since the 1940s. In some states, only regulated raw goat milk is available.
Antidepressants and mass shootings
In an interview with Turkish state-owned TRT World, Kennedy called for research to investigate a possible connection between mass shootings and antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs.
He recently blamed the popular antidepressant Prozac for mass shootings in the United States.
“Before the introduction of Prozac, almost none of these events occurred,” he said in an X discussion space.
Researchers have found no evidence linking antidepressants to school shootings.
Research published in 2019 by the National Library of Medicine in the United States, analyzing available information on school shootings from 2000 to 2017, showed that “most school shooters had not previously been treated with psychotropic medications – and even when they were, no direct or causal association was found.”
– Further reporting by Reuters.
