With US president-elect Donald Trump due to take up office on January 20th, a certain unease is palpable in public discourse. What will he do about Ukraine? Will he introduce a 15 per cent corporate tax rate and trigger the repatriation of Big Pharma – posing a significant threat to the Republic’s public finances? And with Trump promising to let his nominee for Health And Human Services Secretary, Robert F Kennedy jnr, “go wild” on health issues, how will this play out?
In mirroring Trump’s catchphrase “Make America Great Again”, Kennedy copper-fastened his nomination by offering to “Make America Healthy Again” (Maha). Speaking in an NPR interview after his nomination, Kennedy said Trump had given him three “instructions”: to remove “corruption” from health agencies; to return these bodies to “evidence-based science and medicine”; and “to end the chronic disease epidemic”.
Although he has toned down his rhetoric on vaccines since his nomination, Kennedy has been a trenchant critic of immunisation. A founder of the anti-vaccine group the Children’s Health Defense, he referred to the Covid-19 vaccine, credited for saving millions of lives, as the “deadliest vaccine ever made”. One of his main claims — repeated in a 2023 interview with Fox News — was that “autism comes from vaccines”. This old chestnut, advanced by discredited British doctor Andrew Wakefield in 1998, is still having a negative effect on childhood immunisation rates worldwide. But Kennedy has said he has Trump’s backing to further investigate a link between vaccines and autism.
A big part of the Make America Healthy Again agenda is to reverse the chronic disease epidemic in the US
In a recent post on X, Kennedy said that Trump, as president, would be advising “all US water systems to remove fluoride from public water”. Small amounts of fluoride are added to water supplies globally to help prevent tooth decay. Kennedy said fluoride was “associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders, and thyroid disease”. This is not a view shared by dentists and public health experts.
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A big part of the Maha agenda is to reverse the chronic disease epidemic in the US. Kennedy has spoken about an epidemic of chronic disease in children, including autoimmune disease, diabetes, asthma and food allergies. The US is near the bottom across all industrialised countries in child wellbeing and has been for decades. According to the US National Survey of Children’s Health, about 40 per cent of children have a chronic health condition. A focus on how early life experience in childhood predicts adult wellbeing and the population’s health would be welcomed by public health experts.
Kennedy is on less firm terrain when he links ultra-processed foods (UPFs) with a range of medical conditions, including cancers in young adults and mental health illnesses. While there is a growing body of evidence that these foods aren’t good for us, there’s no clear evidence as yet that specific illnesses are caused by UPFs.
Those who support the drinking of raw milk say it contains enzymes that are destroyed by pasteurisation but that help prevent osteoporosis and boost gastrointestinal health and the immune system
Kennedy has said when it comes to milk, he only drinks it raw, meaning it hasn’t gone through a germ-killing pasteurisation process. Those who support the drinking of raw milk say it contains enzymes that are destroyed by pasteurisation but that help prevent osteoporosis and boost gastrointestinal health and the immune system. The Federal Drugs Administration (FDA), however, has rejected these claims, dismissing them as “myths”.
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Kennedy and Trump have aimed at senior FDA mandarins, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control. Former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb has raised concerns about Kennedy’s agenda for the Department of Health and Human Services. “I think if RFK follows through on his intentions, and I believe he will, and I believe he can, it will cost lives in this country,” he told broadcaster CNBC.
So rocky times are ahead for US healthcare, with some of the flagged changes likely to have international repercussions.
Maha notwithstanding, I’d like to wish readers the very best of health for 2025.