Washington – There, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the best health officer of the Nation, in a Shak ‘N Shake with Fox News Sean Hannity, was Hannity. French fries watches.
“The Steak ‘N Shake has been great, we are very grateful for them,” Kennedy said, among the fried potatoes that the west medium franchise announced recently would be cooked in the meat ray instead of common kitchen oils that Kennedy are bad for the diet of the Americans.
It is the type of support that doctors have implored to make about children’s vaccines used to prevent fatal diseases, such as measles as the outbreaks worsened in Texas and New Mexico during their first month in office.
The Secretary of Health and Human Services has raised doubts about vaccines, more recently in his interview with Hannity that the shots cause “deaths every year”, although he then added that vaccines should be encouraged.
In his first month in office, Kennedy, who promised to “make America feel healthy,” has delivered an inconsistent message that has the main specialists in infectious diseases of the nation worried that his warm vaccines recommendations undermine access to long -term remedies.
During his first speech to thousands of workers from federal public health agencies, including the centers for disease control and prevention, as well as food and drug administration, Kennedy promised to “investigate” the calendar of children’s vaccines. Days later, the CDC canceled A public meeting of the Immunization Panel of the Advisory Committee, a group of doctors and scientists who make recommendations on vaccines. That meeting has not been rescheduled.
In another case, a public meeting canceled vaccine advisors who make recommendations on the flu vaccine every year for the FDA has not been given a new date. This week, the National Institutes for HealthAlso under Kennedy’s reach, he began canceling funds for some vaccin investigations.
CDCs are also preparing to investigate autism and vaccines, planning “not leave stone without moving in their mission to discover what is happening exactly,” said HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon, in a statement. Agency officials did not make comments for this article.
Numerous studies have concluded that there is no link between the two, a fact that the agency States on your website.
“What he is trying to do is scare the safety of vaccines,” said Dr. Paul offit, FDA vaccine advisor and infectious disease doctor at the Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia, about Kennedy’s first month in office. “I shouldn’t surprise anyone. Its agenda has always been to obtain vaccines outside the market or make them less available. ”
Offit cares that the cancellation of the FDA flu vaccines meeting, held every March for at least 30 years, is only the beginning. The June committee meeting to recommend the formulation of the COVID-19 vaccine has not been scheduled, he said.
Democrats and Republicans backed away when Dr. Marty Makary, The FDA nomineeHe did not commit to rescheduing the Committee flu meeting.
“What is lost is transparency,” Senator Bill Cassidy, Louisiana’s Republican who presides over the Senate Health Committee that is also a doctor, said.
During its Senate confirmation audiences earlier this year, Kennedy repeatedly rejected any idea that vaccines would undermine. “Support vaccines. I support childhood schedule, ”he said. He promised Cassidy, that he was unstable on the work of Kennedy Anti -Cuna Defense, which would not change the recommendations of existing vaccines.
But Kennedy’s skeptical opinions on vaccines have emerged during interviews and public statements since his confirmation.
He has sent “mixed messages” about vaccine safety, although the United States has “the adverse event surveillance system of more elaborate vaccines in the world,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an expert in infectious diseases at the University of Vanderbilt. Serious problems, including death, are very rare and the benefits of vaccination far exceed the risks, he said.
“A simple way to describe this to the average person is that serious adverse events generally occur at a rate of 1 to a few cases per million doses of vaccine,” he said. “That is a needle in a haystack.”
In an opinion article about Foxnews.com at the beginning of this month, Kennedy said that the measles outbreak in western Texas left a six -year -old boy dead was a “call to action”, but it was not recommending that people receive the vaccine that prevents 97% of cases. Although the United States registered its first measles death in a decade, Kennedy has repeatedly minimized this year’s outbreaks, pointing out that when he was a child “all obtained measles.”
The cases of this year – reported to 250 – They are on their way to overcome last year’s reports of 286 measles infections.
Pediatricians are sending more questions from confused parents in their exam rooms, said Dr. Susan Kressly. Concerned about the reports of canceled vaccine meetings, they wonder about their access against the flu of next year. Others ask if they should obtain doses of the measles, paper and rubella (MMR) vaccine before. Kressly said there is a clear message that the government can send to help stop the counting of increasing cases.
“The only way to stop an outbreak is to increase the positive courier coordinated messaging around vaccination,” Kressly said.
CDCs have helped with vaccination efforts in western Texas. But Kennedy himself has publicly advocated an alternative measles treatment: vitamin A. Under its surveillance, the CDC guide was updated to say that vitamin A should be administered to children with severe measles and prescribed in doses under the supervision of a doctor.
Vitamin A supplementation has been recommended for decades to reduce pneumonia and death in malnourished children in developing countries, but benefits in children well fed in countries like the United States are less clear.
“We need to use vitamin A for those children who have the bad luck of obtaining measles,” said Dr. Andy Pavia, an expert in pediatric infectious diseases from the University of Utah. “But it cannot prevent measles and can only provide some help to reduce gravity.”
When administered correctly, the use of vitamin A in children with severe measles “will not harm,” said Pavia. But if done incorrectly, the high doses of vitamin A can be toxic and mortal.
The abrupt changes of personnel have also dominated Kennedy’s first weeks in office, with the selection of CDC Dave Weldon retire Meros minutes before his audience, the main HHS spokesman for Kennedy left two weeks at work and food administration The newly coined main lawyer who leaves 48 hours in position.
However, Trump and Kennedy supporters have dismissed concerns about the rocky beginning.
His new platform as Secretary of Health and talking about healthier foods is already affecting the change in the American diet, advisors close to Kennedy and Trump have claimed on social networks.
They accredit Kennedy with Republican legislators to introduce bills in Utah and Texas that would prohibit soft drinks in the supplementary nutritional assistance program, for example. And then there are the new Steak ‘N Shake fries.
“RFK Jr. only ate Steak ‘N Shake on live television, the fast food board that is bravely fringed everything in the ray of beef,” said conservative Podcastster Charlie Kirk this week on a tweet. “This is the way.”
On Wednesday, after a meeting with a handful of executives from the largest food manufacturers of the nation, Kennedy launched a business production video that promised that more changes would be on their way, saying that the companies were taking their “Maha” movement seriously.
“They understand that they have a new sheriff in the city,” Kennedy said.
He did not share any details about what was discussed at the meeting.
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Associated Press Matthew Perrone writers and Mike Stobbe contributed.
