Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s tenure as the nation’s top health official is raising alarms over his chaotic policy shifts and questionable science.
Top health officials have been left scrambling by Kennedy’s abrupt and often contradictory announcements, often supported by limited—or even nonexistent—research, Axios reports.
Chris Meekins, a managing director at Raymond James and former health official, pointed to the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Commission report on childhood illnesses, which was riddled with fabricated studies, as a sign of Kennedy’s “unserious” agenda.
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“At the end of the day, they’re going to do what they believe and what they want to do,” Meekins told Axios. “How they go about executing the agenda, I think, is very much in play.”
Kennedy celebrated the release of the MAHA report last week—from which the White House was forced to remove made-up scientific studies—by chugging raw milk with controversial health influencer Dr. Paul Saladino.
Other health experts have expressed growing concern over mixed messages from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) about whether healthy children over six months old and pregnant women should still get COVID-19 vaccines.
Kennedy recently announced that COVID-19 vaccines would no longer be recommended for healthy children and pregnant women—a direct contradiction of previous guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The justification for the move also contained just eight citations, including a 2022 Newsweek opinion piece from Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Marty Makary.
CDC officials were reportedly blindsided by the switch and only learned of it when Kennedy shared a video announcing it on social media.
The CDC has since updated its immunization guidelines to state that healthy children aged from six months to 17 years old may still receive a shot after consulting with a healthcare provider, although there is no such recommendations for healthy pregnant women.
“There’s a new inconsistency every day,” Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, told Axios.
“For many of us, what we’re concerned about is that this is all merging into one anti-vaccine message, and it also is merging into [the administration thinking] ‘We can do whatever we want from a regulatory oversight standpoint,’” he said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services defended Kennedy’s unconventional methods, adding he is the “most influential” HHS Secretary in its history.
“He’s doing what previous administrations would not: challenging outdated systems, cutting through bureaucracy, and delivering accountability to the American people. His approach is deliberate—not traditional for Washington, but urgently needed for a nation that has lost trust in public health institutions,” the spokesperson told The Daily Beast.
“By leveraging direct communication tools like social media, Secretary Kennedy is modernizing how HHS engages with the public, reaching Americans where they are, and with the radical transparency they deserve,” the spokesperson added. “This strategy is about delivering real results and Secretary Kennedy will continue to do exactly that.”
