Kennedy criticized the CDC’s recommendations for lockdowns and masking policies during the COVID-19 pandemic and asserted that they “failed to do anything about the disease itself” at the hearing on Thursday.
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The people who oversaw that process, removed masks from our children, and shut our schools are the ones who will leave, according to Kennedy. He later claimed that because they didn’t do enough to prevent chronic disease, they should be fired.
Democrats accused Kennedy and the administration of playing fast and loose with public health by pushing unscientific measures that undermine public trust in vaccination in a series of heated exchanges.
Republican Senator John Barrasso told Kennedy, “We can’t allow public health to be undermined if we’re going to restore America.” “I’m a doctor. Vaccines “work.”
Kennedy’s tenure at HHS has been marred by controversy as he attempts to reshape the organization by firing officials and scientists who have opposed his promotion of policies that contradict decades of scientific consensus.
According to Al Jazeera correspondent Mike Hanna, who spoke from the US Capitol, “It’s been incredibly contentious, not just from Democrats but also from some Republican members of the Senate committee.”
Kennedy’s stance on vaccines was specifically attacked by a number of committee members, he added.
The former anti-vaccine activist and official representative of the Trump administration confronted a corrupt scientific and public health institution that was tied to corporate interests.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Sue Monarez was fired a few days after the Senate hearing.
Kennedy opened the CDC’s investigation into its actions during the COVID pandemic, blaming the agency for failing “miserably” with “disastrous and nonsensical” measures, including school closures, social distancing, and masking guidance.
He praised the health department’s new emphasis on prevention and chronic disease, saying, “We need bold, competent, and creative new leadership at CDC, people able and willing to chart a new course.”
In a Thursday editorial in the Wall Street Journal, Monarez, the CDC director, accused the secretary of making a “deliberate effort to weaken America’s public health system and vaccine protections.”
Kennedy simply stated, “I asked her, Are you a trustworthy person?,” as he explained to Senator Elizabeth Warren. And she said, ‘ No. ‘”
Due to the high cost of insurance and the lack of affordable public options, access to healthcare is limited in the US. A gap in the country’s healthcare system was filled by declining trust in trusted sources of information on health and well-being, many of whom are online propagators of dubious remedies and unverified ideas.
Before being chosen by President Donald Trump as health secretary in his second administration, Kennedy rose to prominence in the mid-2000s as a prominent anti-vaccine activist.
In the run-up to the election, RFK Jr. became a symbol of the Trump administration’s support for such figures and ideas, even as it reduces funding for programs that support low-income people who are most likely to suffer from health issues. He has since appeared on numerous podcasts.
After pointing out that the HHS secretary had removed a body of experts tasked with making vaccine recommendations and had replaced them with people who were more in line with Kennedy’s own beliefs, Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado sparked an angry exchange with Kennedy.
Bennet claimed that a panel member had propagated the false theory that the COVID-19 vaccine might lead to AIDS transmission.
Should Colorado’s parents and schools be prepared for more measles outbreaks as a result of those [politicizing vaccine recommendations]? What about more “mumps outbreaks”? Bennet contacted.
He rebuffed his accusations, saying, “This is not a podcast.” The American people’s health is in danger, they say.
