RFK Jr.’s policy priorities

If the Senate confirms Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead HHS, the longtime environmental lawyer and vaccine skeptic is poised to reshape public health agencies and could usher in a new era for vaccines and medicines.

RFK Jr. has big plans. He’s talked about restructuring agencies, dismissing hundreds of career staff, reforming food oversight and demanding reams of vaccine data. That said, his confirmation process — which won’t officially start until president-elect Trump takes office — has already been caught in a few crosshairs: There is some early opposition from Republicans including former VP Mike Pence due to his previously liberal views on abortion policy.

But RFK Jr. amassed solid GOP support during Trump’s presidential campaign for his far-ranging “Make America Healthy Again” agenda. I joined STAT colleagues to break down his health care policy views and what he will champion, or what might snag him during Senate grilling. More here.

Plus: RFK Jr. has a long history as an attorney and the chairman for Children's Health Defense, a nonprofit known for spreading doubt about vaccines. While he took leave from his chairmanship to run for office, he hasn't stepped away from their litany of lawsuits about vaccine policy. There's a lot to know about the legal fights CHD deploys, and what that means for HHS under RFK Jr. More from Isabella Cueto.

inside hhs

Tom Price talks new HHS

Trump’s first HHS secretary, Tom Price, has some thoughts about what agency leadership should do in a second term, and what RFK Jr. brings to the table. Price resigned from HHS in September 2017 after Politico reported on his private jet usage. The longtime orthopedic surgeon (he says he’s not practicing right now) served as a member of Congress from 2005 until he was tapped for HHS secretary.

Price told STAT that “fresh eyes” can be important to the HHS role, but “it’s important to allow the process” of Senate confirmation to move forward. Still, he cautioned that RFK Jr. and other potential new arrivals shouldn’t be trying to tear the place down right away.

“There's so many high quality, dedicated folks in HHS, in all of the divisions and the agencies,” he told STAT. “Some of these folks…their life's work is some small, niche area of science, or of health, that has helped not just folks in America, but literally around the world.”

That said, Price predicted “some push by the efficiency side of the incoming administration,” (aka DOGE) to find cuts. But one area he said he wants to see the incoming Trump officials tackle early: Health care workforce needs, and potential immigration reforms to help. (Get in touch with DCD if you have thoughts on that!)

infectious diseases

There’s bad news on the H5N1 front

The genetic sequence of the bird flu virus that infected a teenager in British Columbia shows that the virus had undergone mutational changes that would make it easier for that version of H5N1 to infect people, Helen Branswell reports.

The teenager remains in critical condition in hospital. While there is no evidence the patient infected anyone else — and researchers believe the virus mutated while they were infected — it’s a concerning development in a virus that officials have reassured the public is not an immediate threat.

“By no means is this Day 1 of a pandemic,” one expert told Helen. “But this is exactly the scenario that we fear.” Read more on what this means.

industry intel

Why the health industry is actually optimistic about ACA subsidies

Enhanced tax credits that help millions of middle-income Americans afford health plans on the ACA’s individual marketplaces expire at the end of 2025. Conservatives have railed against those subsidies as wasteful spending, but ending them has huge implications, as Bob Herman writes.

That’s why hospital and insurance executives are banking on President-elect Trump and congressional Republicans not killing the program. They are betting that GOP lawmakers and the president won’t want to take the blame if millions of people who currently get these subsidies — many of whom live in red states — suddenly find themselves with coverage they can’t afford.

This optimism isn’t necessarily rooted in political analysis, Bob writes. It’s financial, and those figures say a lot for the industry. More from him.

vaccine policy

How vaccine liability works, and what RFK Jr. wants to do

Kennedy has criticized laws that provide companies that make vaccines with protections from lawsuits. If he takes office, he has broad power to strip those protections, Rachel Cohrs Zhang writes.

Manufacturers of most routine vaccines have had protections from lawsuits for nearly 40 years, and makers of vaccines developed to address emergencies have enjoyed protections for 20. That set of laws was vaulted into controversy during the Covid-19 pandemic. RFK Jr. soon harnessed that energy and criticized legal protections for vaccine makers.

Experts told Rachel that an HHS secretary, as he could soon be, could disrupt vaccine liability protections without turning to Congress. Read more.

opinion section

Opinion: Why I call RFK Jr. Anti-vaxx

Jonathan Berman, a scientist who has studied and written about the anti-vaccine movement, weighed in on STAT yesterday about his RFK Jr. concerns and why he won’t shy away from calling the HHS nominee an anti-vaxxer.

Berman argued that some, including RFK Jr. himself, have already begun whitewashing his positions on vaccines and vaccination policy. He dives into the nominee’s long history with vaccine theories and health care, writing, “if someone consistently opposes vaccination, promotes vaccine misinformation, and works to dismantle vaccine programs, then the label ‘anti-vaxxer’ fits, regardless of how they describe themselves.” More from Berman.

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Trump allies eye overhauling Medicaid, food stamps in tax legislation, The Washington Post
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