NEWSROOM

A grassroots organization of health professionals have released a report outlining major health challenges in the US and calling for the removal of Robert F Kennedy Jr from the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The report from Defend Public Health, a new organization of about 3,000 health professionals and allies, is an attempt to get ahead of misinformation and lack of information from health officials.

DPH Coordinating Committee members Miranda Yaver and Beth Jacobs outline how HHS Secretary Kennedy is seeking to undermine the Affordable Care Act and limit access to vaccines by stocking a key advisory committee with anti-vaxxers.

DPH member Aimee Pugh Bernard and colleagues discuss findings of a recent study that counters disinformation about supposed harms of aluminum in vaccines, and the ongoing attempts to discredit the study by HHS director Robert F Kennedy Jr.

This outstanding piece coauthored by DPH member Aimee Pugh Bernard highlights the benefits of mRNA technology, and the impact when science is attacked by government officials.

DPH Coordinating Committee member Gregg Gonsalves argues that attacks on public health can't be viewed or fought in isolation. They're part of a larger antidemocratic assault on freedom of thought and expression, including academic freedom. To successfully fight back, he writes, "we’re going to have to be part of a united democratic front with other groups working to oppose and fight democratic backsliding in the United States."

Coordinating Committee member Elizabeth Jacobs' social media post gets quoted in a news story about HHS Secretary Kennedy's latest attack on vaccines: "The end result of this idiocy could well be that vaccine manufacturers will stop making vaccines here."

DPH members Teri Mills and Donna Gaffney discuss how cuts to SNAP counter Robert Kennedy's own statements on the importance of nutrition and push families further into food insecurity.

DPH members Teri Mills and Dr. Wendy Hasson discuss Oregon district 2 Rep. Cliff Bentz's support for Medicaid cuts and their grave impact on constituents in his district.

As the anti-vaccine group formerly headed by HHS Secretary Kennedy pushes him to move more aggressively, Coordinating Committee member Elizabeth Jacobs points out that, pre-RFK Jr., the CDC and FDA were well set-up to evaluate the safety and efficacy of vaccines.

DPH Coordinating Committee member Bruce Mirken asks whether Trump and HHS Secretary Kennedy are inviting a new AIDS pandemic with their draconian cuts to research, prevention, treatment and foreign aid. His answer: It sure looks like they're trying.

Could RFK Jr. do as much damage to a variety of preventive services (such as pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV) as he as begun doing to vaccines? Coordinating Committee member Gregg Gonsalves argues that he could, and that the U.S. Supreme Court recently handed him the means with which to do it.