The News
US President-elect Donald Trump nominated vaccine skeptic and former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be the country’s health and human services secretary.
“For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health,” Trump wrote on social media. “Mr. Kennedy will restore these Agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research, and beacons of Transparency, to end the Chronic Disease epidemic, and to Make America Great and Healthy Again!”
Kennedy, a former environmental lawyer, has said he would remove fluoride from drinking water and roll back mandatory childhood vaccines if he were in office as part of a broader, radical overhaul of the US’ approach to medicine and health.
SIGNALS
Kennedy’s nomination draws conflicting partisan reaction in Washington
Kennedy’s nomination drew mixed reactions from Republicans and Democrats: Trump’s former Vice President Mike Pence opposed Kennedy’s pro-abortion stance, while Colorado’s Democratic governor said he was “excited” for Kennedy to take on “big pharma.” The conflicting partisan reaction is because Kennedy’s beliefs are hard to parse given that he “has said a whole lot about a whole lot,” CNN’s Brian Stelter wrote, in which “kernels of truth” are mixed with “downright false” information, neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta said. Trump’s range of cabinet picks — from mainstream lawmakers to television news hosts — has also divided those abroad: One European lawmaker told Politico that Trump’s choice of Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence was “terrifying.”
Health stocks tumble after Kennedy nomination
Trump’s choice of a vaccine skeptic for the top country’s top health job hit stocks of major US vaccine makers: Moderna’s dropped nearly 8% Friday, while Pfizer fell 4.5%. Share prices of the world’s two biggest vaccine makers by sales, GSK and Sanofi, also took a hit, Financial Times reported. Kennedy’s nomination impacted biotech and pharmaceutical stocks more broadly, Bloomberg reported, as shares of US-exposed European health companies, including Ozempic maker Novo Nordisk, dropped. Trump’s choice exacerbated the already “dim” outlook for vaccine makers grappling with declining sales growth, a Jeffries analyst told the FT. “RFK Jr has . . . been outspoken about downsizing FDA, so there is concern on agency resources, commentary on [weight loss drugs] and also vaccines,” he said.
Kennedy’s promise to ban water fluoridation stirs debate
While public health experts have condemned many of Kennedy’s proposals as being anti-science, his fight to remove fluoride from drinking water has sparked more debate. “It’s not an entirely crazy idea,” The Washington Post’s public health columnist argued, citing studies showing some risks of higher levels of fluoride, and pointing to several Western European countries that have ended public water fluoridation. While acknowledging that the US uses safe and beneficial levels of fluoride in water, economist Emily Oster argued in The New York Times that it’s a “complex topic,” which public health authorities shouldn’t be dismissive of. Despite fluoride’s clear benefits in preventing dental problems, it is one of the “original public health conspiracy theories” in the US, a political historian told NPR.