What to expect at RFK Jr.’s first Senate hearing as health secretary
WASHINGTON AP Republican Sen Bill Cassidy craved an assurance from Robert F Kennedy Jr before he would vote to put him in charge of the nation s trillion vitality department Kennedy s history of promoting conspiracy theories or misspeaking about vaccines alarmed Cassidy he stated during a confirmation hearing earlier this year So the Louisiana senator requested Can I trust that that is now in the past Kennedy didn t give a direct answer that day Now three months into the job however Kennedy s habit of casting doubts on vaccines has returned in interviews on television shows society speeches and social media posts Kennedy will make his first appearance as fitness secretary before Cassidy s powerful Senate medical committee on Wednesday when he s expected to face intense scrutiny about the thousands of job he s eliminated at the Department of Fitness and Human Services the steep cuts he s made to vaccination campaigns and his response to a measles outbreak that s sickened people He will speak about the agency s budget request for the year which includes a million boost for his Make America Healthy Again initiative to promote nutrition and healthier lifestyles The proposed budget also makes deep cuts including to infectious malady prevention maternal vitality and preschool programs The secretary plans to share his vision on how HHS transformation will improve strength outcomes eliminate redundancies to save the American taxpayer and streamline operations to improve efficiency and institution HHS explained in a announcement to The Associated Press Kennedy s supporters meanwhile have viewed his first three months in the job as a flourishing delivery of MAHA agenda items He s pressured food companies to ditch artificial dyes promised to examination the cause of autism vowed to reverse fluoride recommendations and earned buy-in from several Republican governors to ban soda from the food stamp effort for example But a large number of eyes and ears will be on Kennedy s dialogue with Cassidy who extracted a number of guarantees from Kennedy about his approach to vaccines Those included promises to keep the current childhood vaccination schedule use the current vaccine monitoring system and not remove statements that say vaccines do not cause autism on the Centers for Malady Control and Prevention website I will watch meticulously for any effort to wrongfully sow inhabitants fear about vaccines between confusing references of coincidences and anecdote Cassidy mentioned earlier this year after voting in favor of Kennedy s nomination Kennedy has since delivered a mixed message on vaccines that population healthcare experts have announced are hampering efforts to contain the measles outbreak He s offered endorsements of vaccinations but continued to raise questions about their efficacy or safety He s revealed the childhood vaccine schedule will be examined in a inquiry of autism s causes He s called the measles mumps and rubella vaccine a shot given to children to provide immunity from all three diseases leaky although it offers lifetime protection from the measles for most of people He s also commented they cause deaths although none has been documented among healthy people At the agency too he s made moves that help the anti-vaccine movement He hired a man who has published research that suggests vaccines cause developmental delays to oversee a research on autism And he s terminated various research and general physical condition funds dedicated to vaccines Kennedy who has rejected the anti-vaccine label has regularly commented that he is pro-safety and wants more research on vaccines although decades of real-world use and research have concluded they safely prevent deadly diseases in children His longstanding advocacy has reliably focused on ensuring that vaccines and other curative interventions meet the highest standards of safety and are supported by gold-standard science HHS mentioned in a declaration As he did during confirmation Secretary Kennedy is prepared to address questions surrounding this topic Source
