As RFK Jr. Unveils Well being Report, Medical Leaders Press Their Personal Message: Vaccines Work

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The nation’s prime well being officers, regulators, and coverage wonks huddled on the eighth ground of the Division of Well being and Human Companies on Tuesday to take a victory lap for a brand new report on kids’s well being that was huge on hype—128 concepts!—however slim on precise prescriptions.

At a separate occasion known as by Sen. Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist from Vermont, there was railing in regards to the huge hypocrisy popping out of the Trump administration in the case of well being priorities.

Each match the sample of Washington proper now: plenty of noise round following the actual science, however the place that science leads is dependent upon who’s the tutor. Sanders had main medical figures standing with him. However HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is operating the most important well being operation on this planet.

On the unveiling of a report by Kennedy’s Make America Well being Once more Fee, the canine whistles had been extra like foghorns.

Kennedy’s report raises questions on when kids ought to get what vaccines when and whether or not fluoride in consuming water is at secure ranges—two areas the place main consultants have stated he’s spreading misinformation. A brand new Nationwide Institutes of Well being middle to check childhood power illness was additionally proposed, on prime of wanting extra data on the patterns behind how youngsters had been prescribed anti-depressants and medicines to deal with ADHD. The report additionally needs a more in-depth have a look at the consequences of electromagnetic radiation, the microbiome, and the foundation causes of autism. Oh, and the reviews’ authors need a public-education marketing campaign aimed toward bettering fertility. (Sure, that made its manner right into a report about kids’s well being.)

Extra broadly, the report criticizes ultra-processed meals, chemical over-exposure, and overmedication. Kennedy known as for extra research into vaccine accidents, which he argued are far under-reported, and the over-prescription of medication. However the suggestions stopped wanting a ban on pesticides and processed meals for teenagers, which had some business insiders on Okay Avenue pondering they’d dodged one among their largest fears of the Secretary’s campaign.

In brief: it’s an inventory of targets however not actual concrete steps to realize any of them. The vagueness would be the level to offer Kennedy cowl from his rising camp of critics whereas letting the MAHA of us suppose they’re getting their want checklist. It could be too cute by half.

“There’s by no means been an effort like this throughout all the federal government companies,” Kennedy boasted as different Cupboard and prime administration officers surrounded the made-for-TV debrief.

Hours earlier, Sanders was bashing Kennedy and Republicans for his or her skepticism about vaccines, hostility to experience, and purge of medical expertise—together with prime palms on the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention and the Meals and Drug Administration.