In a letter signed by over 15,000 physicians, senators are urged to vote against the confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the candidate for secretary of health and human services nominated by President-elect Donald Trump.
According to the letter, 336 million Americans’ health and wellbeing depend on HHS leadership that places a high priority on science, evidence-based medicine, and preserving the integrity of our public health system. In addition to being unfit to serve as the head of this crucial organization, RFK Jr. is deliberately hazardous.
A physician advocacy group called the Committee to Protect Health Care shared the letter online. The letter lists further conspiracy theories Kennedy has actively promoted, in addition to his well-documented anti-vaccine beliefs and lobbying, such as his support of unproven Covid-19 treatments and erroneous allegations linking school shootings to antidepressants.
According to the letter, this appointment is a smack in the face to all medical professionals who have dedicated their lives to shielding patients from avoidable disease and death.
Kennedy has been on Capitol Hill talking with both Democratic and Republican senators in preparation for his confirmation hearing, which has not yet been scheduled. If every Democrat in the Senate votes against Kennedy’s confirmation, he would require all but three Republican votes.
A request for comment on the letter was not answered by Kennedy. When questioned by text regarding the wave of resistance from medical professionals and public health groups to Trump’s plan to nominate Kennedy, Kennedy’s transition team spokesman, Katie Miller, dismissed the criticism as merely another scammer who would defraud advocacy group donors.
Miller texted, “Those who are wasting their time trying to discredit Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will have no place or voice at HHS once he is confirmed.” I wish them luck and the best.
The latest reactions from doctors and public health advocates to Kennedy’s contentious appointment include the letter and a campaign that calls on medical professionals to get in touch with their senators and the American Medical Association.
Kennedy’s 2019 trip to Samoa prior to a measles outbreak that killed 83 people, the most of whom were children, was the focus of a study and digital advertisements released this week by the leftist nonprofit organization Protect Our Care, which works to maintain the Affordable Care Act. In an article published this week in The New York Times, Hawaii Governor Josh Green, a doctor, claimed that Kennedy’s dissemination of false information about vaccines contributed to the outbreak in Samoa and cautioned that public health would be at risk if he were appointed to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Kennedy would put people’s lives in jeopardy if given a position of power over health care, according to news releases from the nonprofit progressive consumer rights organization Public Citizen and the health care consumer advocacy group Community Catalyst in November.
On Wednesday, Green joined other members of Congress with public health expertise at a news conference against Kennedy hosted by 314 Action, a progressive political action group that supports the election of scientists.
Kennedy’s supporters and a devoted political action committee, American Values 2024, have claimed that pharmaceutical interests were behind the resistance to his appointment in order to silence him and thwart his attempts to improve America’s health.
In state-level initiatives to establish prescription medication affordability boards, the Committee to Protect Health Care, which is not supported by the pharmaceutical business or for-profit health corporations, has been vocal in its opposition to pharmaceutical companies.
“We are definitely not friends with Pharma, and they are not friends with us,” stated Dr. Rob Davidson, the executive director of the committee and an emergency department physician from Michigan.
Davidson claimed that patients inspired him and the thousands of other signers to sign the letter.
He stated that Kennedy poses an obvious and immediate threat.