Welcome to Public Health Watch, a weekly roundup from Protect Our Care tracking catastrophic activity as part of Donald Trump’s sweeping war on health care. From installing anti-vaccine zealot RFK Jr. as Secretary of HHS to empowering Elon Musk to make indiscriminate cuts to our public health infrastructure, including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control, Donald Trump is endangering the lives of millions of Americans. Protect Our Care’s Public Health Watch will shine a spotlight on the worst of the Trump/RFK war on vaccines, science and public health and serve as a resource for the press, public and advocacy groups to hold them accountable.
What’s Happening In Public Health?
Dangerous Chaos At The HHS and the CDC
New York Times: Trump Is Shutting Down the War On Cancer Since President Richard Nixon declared war on cancer more than 50 years ago, America’s cancer-research system has been a triumph of government-funded science. Although some 40 percent of Americans will still get a cancer diagnosis at some point in their life, this sprawling research system — which reaches into universities all across the country — has yielded decades of minor breakthroughs that has saved millions of lives and improve the quality of life for those undergoing cancer treatments. Today, with the benefits of decades of accrued knowledge and new advances in technology, cancer researchers are on the brink of further breakthroughs that could enable doctors to detect possible tumors earlier and treat them more effectively and with fewer short- and long-term side effects. But the Trump administration’s sweeping cuts to American cancer research are putting the entire system — and with it, future progress — in jeopardy.
Bloomberg: Fired CDC Head to Say RFK Jr. Put Political Oversight on Policy Susan Monarez will offer new details on her ouster as head of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at a Congressional hearing, including that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. directed that all policy and personnel decisions would have to be cleared by the agency’s political staff. Monarez — who was fired just weeks into the job as CDC director — is set to testify in front of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee on Wednesday. In prepared testimony seen by Bloomberg ahead of the hearing, Monarez offers new detail, including that Kennedy issued a directive to her stating that the CDC’s decisions would need to be approved by the agency’s political staffers, a striking departure from past administrations.
New Yorker: Inside the Chaos at the C.D.C. A few current C.D.C. employees, who recently spoke to me on the condition of anonymity, described how it feels to remain at the agency after eight months of turmoil under the second Trump Administration. They pointed back to the humiliations wrought by the Department of Government Efficiency, beginning with an e-mail, in February, from Elon Musk encouraging them to quit their jobs and enter the private sector. “That e-mail sent shock waves through us,” one employee told me. “Out of nowhere, looked like spam, seemed ridiculous and against federal policy. And so insulting. Since then, we’ve constantly had something new uprooting us.” Another employee added, “We’ve gone from sending our five bullet points to justify our ‘lower productivity jobs in the public sector’ to actual bullets. Ten years ago, we were heroes for deploying to West Africa for the Ebola outbreak, protecting our country from the spread of the disease, and now, somehow, we are the villains. It’s crushing that those appointed to lead us and the people we aim to protect think we are actively deceiving them.” This employee was near “a breaking point.” The other employee was, too: “Everyone has a limit,” they told me, “and there are many of us being pushed to the brink.” So, too, is America’s public-health system. It will be something of a miracle, Jernigan thinks, if the country’s next major health threat is met with the same skill, resources, and strategy as the last one.
Bloomberg: How RFK Jr. Is Pushing the CDC to the Brink Since it was established almost 80 years ago, the CDC has been considered the gold standard for public health. For generations, the world has looked to the agency for guidance during dangerous disease outbreaks, with its website frequently bookmarked by physicians across the country looking for science-backed recommendations. “You don’t get that big picture without the CDC,” Wells says But in the months since Kennedy took over the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC, the agency has been thrown into disarray. HHS laid off thousands of CDC employees in April, including people studying chronic disease—Kennedy’s central issue—before bringing back some workers as a result of various lawsuits. In June, Kennedy fired all the members of an influential vaccine panel that makes recommendations and decides which immunizations will be covered by insurance or offered to low-income children for free, and he handpicked its new members, many of whom are critics of vaccinations. Since then, the chaos has only picked up speed. In August, a gunman, frustrated by the Covid vaccine, fired almost 500 rounds at the Atlanta-based agency in an attack, killing a local police officer. Later that month, President Donald Trump’s new nominee for CDC director, Susan Monarez, was fired just weeks into the job. The deputy secretary of HHS, Jim O’Neill, a Silicon Valley biotech investor, is filling the role on an interim basis. Meanwhile, state and local health departments, which get a bulk of their funding from the CDC, have sued to claw back some federal funding that HHS canceled earlier in the year.
In a very short time, “we’ve seen an incredible destruction of the agency that leaves people here and around the world at increasing risk,” says Richard Besser, former acting director of the agency. “These kinds of self-inflicted wounds are the worst kind, because it didn’t have to be this way.”
More on the crisis at HHS:
- Associated Press: Law enforcement officers remember police officer killed in CDC shooting in Atlanta
- KFF Health News: Under Trump, FDA Seeks To Abandon Expert Reviews of New Drugs
RFK Jr.’s War on Vaccines Will Have Deadly Consequences
Washington Post: Trump officials to link covid shots to child deaths, alarming career scientists Trump health officials plan to link coronavirus vaccines to the deaths of 25 children as they consider limiting which Americans should get the shots, according to four people familiar with the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe confidential information. The findings appear to be based on information submitted to the federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), which contains unverified reports of side effects or bad experiences with vaccines submitted by anyone, including patients, doctors, pharmacists or even someone who sees a report on social media. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention emphasizes that the database is not designed to assess whether a shot caused a death, a conclusion that requires thorough investigations by scientists and public health professionals. Trump health officials plan to include the pediatric deaths claim in a presentation next week to an influential panel of advisers to the CDC that is considering new coronavirus vaccine recommendations, which affect access to the shots and whether they’re free. The plan has alarmed some career scientists who say that coronavirus vaccines have been extensively studied, including in children, and that the dangers of the virus itself are being underplayed.
Associated Press: Trump administration to award a no-bid contract on research into vaccines and autism Federal health officials intend to award a contract to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute to investigate whether there is a link between vaccinations and autism, according to a government procurement notice. The Troy, New York, engineering school is getting the no-bid contract because of its “unique ability” to link data on children and mothers, according to the notice posted this week. Officials at the Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to questions about the notice, including how much the contract is for or what exactly the researchers intend to do. U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a leading voice in the antivaccine movement before President Donald Trump selected him to oversee federal health agencies, announced in April a “massive testing and research effort” to determine the cause of autism by this month. He has repeatedly tried to link vaccines to the condition.
Axios: RFK Jr. appoints five more members to vaccine panel Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Monday added five members to serve on his handpicked vaccine advisory panel just days ahead of a key meeting where the group will make recommendations for who should get COVID shots. Why it matters: Some of the new members were critical of the pandemic response or faced charges of spreading misinformation. Last month’s firing of Centers for Disease Control director Susan Monarez, along with the resignations of several top agency scientists and appointment of some outside experts with known anti-vaccine views, left few guardrails on Kennedy’s agenda. The new members are: Kirk Milhoan, pediatric cardiologist and former U.S. Air Force flight surgeon based in Hawai’i, who was accused — and then cleared by the state medical board — of spreading COVID-19 misinformation. Catherine Stein, a professor and epidemiologist at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio, who criticized the state’s models for crafting its policy response to COVID as “cloaked in secrecy” in a testimonial to state lawmakers in 2020. Hilary Blackburn, a pharmacist and director of medication access and affordability at AscensionRx in Missouri, per LinkedIn. Evelyn Griffin, an OB-GYN in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Raymond Pollak, a surgeon and transplant specialist.
Politico: Fear over RFK Jr. vaccine panel’s looming decisions on childhood shots Vaccine advisers for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are expected this week to consider softening or eliminating recommendations for some routine childhood immunizations — which doctors say could significantly depress vaccination rates and trigger more infectious disease outbreaks. Any decisions by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices — now mainly composed of members who share Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vaccine skepticism — will be closely scrutinized, given the dramatic events at the Department of Health and Human Services and in Congress in recent weeks.
Washington Post: ‘Can we talk about RFK Jr.?’ A dark cloud hangs over vaccine makers Vaxcyte had high hopes for a vaccine in early stages of development that could stem the scourge of school-age children and their parents: the bacterial infection that causes strep throat. “There’s a profound amount of disease that’s generated in primary schoolchildren as they congregate,” Grant Pickering, the vaccine maker’s CEO, said at an investment conference in June. Less than two months later, Vaxcyte announced that it would hold off starting human trials for its strep vaccine, citing a need to conserve cash for its most advanced vaccine and a “dynamic macro environment.” The macro environment of American vaccine policy is being radically reshaped by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — an abrupt shift that is casting a pall on the business of developing vaccines.
More on vaccine access:
- Stat: House appropriators snub Kennedy, include mRNA vaccine funding in spending bill
- WBRZ: Cassidy asks Kennedy to promote vaccines targeting whooping cough after major outbreak
RFK Jr. Is A Political Liability For Trump And Republicans
Reuters: Just 1 in 4 Americans believe Trump administration vaccine shifts are based on science, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds Only one in four Americans believe that recent recommendations for fewer vaccines from President Donald Trump’s administration were based on scientific evidence and facts, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll. The administration, while still in the process of setting new vaccination policies, has signaled that young and healthy people and pregnant women shouldn’t get shots for the COVID-19 virus. That marks a reversal of a historic vaccination drive against the sickness that Trump, a Republican, started at the tail end of his 2017-2021 presidential term. The Reuters/Ipsos poll, conducted in the five days through Tuesday, showed 24% of respondents – including 5% of Democrats and 48% of Republicans – thought new federal vaccine recommendations were based on science and facts. Overall, 48% of respondents thought the policy was not based on science and facts, with the rest unsure or opting not to answer the question.
New York Times: Vaccines and C.D.C. Chaos Expose Tensions Between Trump and Kennedy Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. faced a tricky moment on Tuesday when he released a report outlining President Trump’s “Make America Healthy Again” strategy. Asked by a reporter if he agreed with Mr. Trump’s comment that some vaccines work, “pure and simple,” Mr. Kennedy, a famous vaccine skeptic, at first ducked the question. “I agree with that,” Mr. Kennedy finally said. Mr. Trump’s top domestic policy adviser, who presided over the event, banged his gavel, bringing questions to a close. The awkward scene capped a particularly fraught two weeks for the president and his celebrity health secretary. While there is no evidence that Mr. Trump is going to break with Mr. Kennedy, the secretary has lately caused consternation among some of the president’s aides and the president himself for a series of negative headlines about chaos inside the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and about his views on vaccines. The White House projected itself as unbothered when Mr. Kennedy pushed out Susan Monarez, the C.D.C. director, just one month after the Senate confirmed her. But two people briefed on what took place said Mr. Trump — who declared Dr. Monarez “an incredible mother and dedicated public servant” when he nominated her — was irritated by the situation and all the negative coverage. Mr. Kennedy’s sharp criticism of Covid-19 vaccines has also been a sticking point. In recent days, White House officials — though not Mr. Trump directly — sent Mr. Kennedy and his advisers a message telling him to tone down his rhetoric, according to two people briefed on the discussions. That is partly because of concerns the White House has heard from some allies about Mr. Kennedy’s comments, as well as Mr. Trump’s own pride in Operation Warp Speed, the initiative that produced the shots in his first term.
Stat: Why Trump’s former surgeon general wants Kennedy removed: ‘An absolute failure of leadership’ Former surgeon general Jerome Adams has a rule for himself: focus on the policy, not the person. But last week, he broke that rule when he called for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be removed from his post as Health and Human Services secretary. Adams, who served as surgeon general during President Trump’s first administration, has become a prominent critic of public health policy in the president’s second term. He is particularly active on X, where he often goes toe-to-toe with science skeptics. STAT spoke with Adams about what pushed him to call for Kennedy’s removal, the fallout from the latest chaos inside the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the growing unease inside Republican health circles.
Vaccines In The States
Politico: States counter RFK Jr.’s vaccine moves, but many people could be left without access Several blue and purple states that typically follow federal vaccine guidance are breaking with the Trump administration and taking steps to bolster immunizations. But tens of millions of people could still be left without access to free shots heading into the fall flu season. A flurry of bills and executive orders in Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and other blue and purple states aim to guarantee vaccine availability at pharmacies and push insurance companies to cover the shots regardless of what federal officials recommend. Yet even the state lawmakers and medical experts supporting the new policies fear they won’t be enough to mitigate the harm of an expected federal rollback of access to several different vaccines for both children and adults. Regardless of state actions, tens of millions of people could lose coverage for the shots and be faced with high out-of-pocket costs, including Medicare enrollees, military members and veterans, and people on employer plans that must adhere to federal regulations.
Other Dangerous MAHA Initiatives
New York Times: The Jarring Contradiction at the Heart of Kennedy’s Agenda Since taking office in February, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has put an unmistakable stamp on American vaccine policy. He has effectively restricted access to Covid shots, installed skeptics to influential posts and ousted the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention after she defied his orders on inoculations. But Mr. Kennedy has applied a far lighter touch to what he and his Make America Healthy Again movement have described as the other major scourge plaguing American children: pesticides and unhealthy foods. Far from cracking down on food and farming practices, Mr. Kennedy’s MAHA commission report on Tuesday defended existing pesticide review procedures and, in some cases, called for loosening food regulations, even as the report promised future steps to clean up what children eat. To many scientists — and some of Mr. Kennedy’s own followers — the gap between the health secretary’s use of his authority over food quality and his pummeling of vaccines has created a jarring split screen.
Newsweek: RFK Jr’s MAHA Report Sparks Concern From Experts Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr has released his “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) report, and experts have warned that its contents, particularly in relation to vaccines and autism, could have major implications on public health. The report lays out significant changes Kennedy Jr. intends to implement to reduce the prevalence of chronic disease in children, transforming America’s food, health and scientific systems. It has also taken a jab at the current immunization schedule followed in the country, saying that it requires further investigation to determine its safety and advisability.
Rolling Stone: RFK Jr. Is Making It Harder for Kids to Eat Healthy The rise of Make America Healthy Again arrived with big promises for kids: an end to chronic disease, a focus on nutrition and healthier school meals. For school food professionals and public health advocates, it seemed like an unexpected win that could benefit the millions of children who rely on federal school meals, often the most nutritious — and sometimes the only reliable — food they receive all day. That push to improve children’s health from a Republican administration was all the more surprising, considering the political attacks Michelle Obama endured when she campaigned to improve school nutrition. But those hopes are colliding with reality. Despite MAHA’s rhetoric, the Trump administration has cut programs supporting children’s health and school nutrition. In March, the U.S. Department of Agriculture abruptly canceled the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement and Local Food for Schools programs, which together provided more than $1 billion to help schools and food banks buy produce, meat and dairy from local farms and ranches.
Other MAHA Activity:
- Axios: MAHA faithful still divided over priorities after report
- Washington Post: Linda McMahon and RFK Jr.: Children need natural sources of mental health
Public Health Threats
Los Angeles Times: L.A. child dies from complication of measles infection contracted in infancy A school-age child in Los Angeles County has died from a rare complication of measles after contracting the disease in infancy, the county public health department announced Thursday. The child — who was not old enough to be vaccinated at the time of infection — died from subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, a fatal progressive brain disorder that strikes roughly 1 in 10,000 people infected with measles in the U.S. Doctors believe the risk is as high as 1 in every 600 children who contract measles as a baby.
The disorder typically develops two to 10 years after initial infection, even when — as in this child’s case — the patient recovers fully from measles. The disease begins with seizures, cognitive decline and involuntary muscle spasms, and progresses to dementia, coma and eventually death. “Most pediatricians in the U.S. have never seen a child with SSPE because we’ve been vaccinating kids against measles for decades,” said Dr. Adam Ratner, a New York-based pediatric infectious-disease specialist and author of the book, “Booster Shots: The Urgent Lessons of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children’s Health.”
Washington Post: Why 1 in 6 U.S. parents are rejecting vaccine recommendations The American parents who are choosing to skip or delay vaccines for their children are more likely to home-school their children, be White and very religious, identify as Republican or be under 35, according to a wide-ranging Washington Post-KFF poll that sheds new light on what drives vaccine hesitancy. The poll — the most detailed recent look at the childhood vaccination practices and opinions of American parents — shows that 1 in 6 parents have delayed or skipped some vaccines for their children, excluding for coronavirus or flu. Nine percent have skipped the polio or measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) shots, which public health experts say risks large outbreaks of potentially fatal diseases which have been curbed through widespread vaccination. The poll finds concerns about the vaccines themselves are driving these decisions. Parents who reject vaccine recommendations are primarily worried about side effects and the risks of the shots rather than facing challenges getting them. About half of parents overall lack faith in federal health agencies to ensure vaccine safety, mirroring the findings of other surveys.